I glanced around, and very fortunately saw another disengaged taxi, which I entered, giving the man instructions to keep the other in view, with a promise of double fare. Instantly the man entered into the spirit of the enterprise, and away we went towards the Circus, and thence by way of Oxford Street to the Euston Road, where before a small private hotel quite close to the station Suzor descended, and, paying the man, entered.

For three hours I waited outside, but he did not emerge. Then I went to the Carlton, and from the reception-clerk ascertained that Monsieur Suzor was staying there, but he did not always sleep there. Sometimes he would be absent for two or three nights. He went away into the country, the smart young clerk believed.

Hence I established the curious fact that Gaston Suzor when in London had two places of abode, one in that best-known hotel, and the other in the obscurity of a frowsy house patronized by lower-class visitors to London.

What could be the motive, I wondered?

I returned to the Carlton at midnight and inquired for Monsieur Suzor. The night-clerk told me that he had not yet returned.

So I went back to the cold cheerlessness of Rivermead Mansions, and slept until the following morning.

At each turn I seemed to be confronted by mystery which piled upon mystery. Ever before my eyes I saw that handsome girl lying cold and lifeless, and I had forged a certificate in the name of a well-known medical man, upon which her body had been reduced to ashes! That I had acted as accomplice to some cunning and deliberate crime I could not disguise from myself. It was now up to me to make amends before God and man, to strive to solve the enigma and to bring the guilty persons to justice.

This was what I was endeavouring, with all my soul, to accomplish.

Yet the point was whether Gabrielle Engledue was really dead, or whether she still existed in the person of Gabrielle Tennison. That was the first fact for me to establish.

Next morning I rose early and gazed across the cold misty Thames to the great factories and wharves upon the opposite bank. The outlook was indeed dull and dispiriting, I stood recalling how Moroni had walked with the beautiful girl in the streets of Florence, unwillingly it seemed, for he certainly feared lest his companion be recognized. I also recollected the strange conversation I had heard with my own ears, and the curious attitude which little Mrs. Cullerton had adopted towards me, even though she had revealed to me the whereabouts of Gabrielle Tennison.