"The last letter, which I received at Gib. ten days ago, was from the Hotel Bristol, at Botzen, in the Tyrol, yet Bartlett says she has been seen down at Eastbourne."
"But you have an address where you always write to her, I suppose?"
"Yes, a secret one. I have written and made an appointment, but she has not kept it. She has been prevented, of course. She may be with her parents, and unable to come to London."
"You did not know that they had fled, and were in hiding?"
"Of course not. What I've heard to-night is news to me—amazing news."
"And does it not convey to you the truth?"
"It does—a ghastly truth concerning Elma Heath," he answered in a low voice, as though speaking to himself.
"Tell me. What? I'm dying, Jack, to know everything concerning her. Who is that fellow Oberg?"
"Her enemy. She, by mere accident, learned his secret and Woodroffe's, and they now both live in deadly fear of her."
"And for that reason she was taken to Siena, where some villainous Italian doctor was bribed to render her deaf and dumb."