“Well?”

“Woodroffe, after meeting me, disappeared—­went to Hamburg, they said, on business.  Then other things occurred.  A man and woman were found murdered up in the wood about a mile and a half from the castle.  The man was made up to represent my man Olinto—­I believe you’ve seen him in Leghorn?”

“What!  They’ve killed Olinto?” he gasped, starting from his chair.

“No.  The fellow was made up very much like him.  But his wife Armida was killed.”

“They killed the woman, and believed they had also killed her husband, eh?” he said bitterly through his teeth, and I saw that his strong hands grasped the arms of his chair firmly.  “And Martin Woodroffe is engaged to Muriel Leithcourt.  Are you certain of this?”

“Yes; quite certain.”

“And is there no suspicion as to who is the assassin of the woman Santini and this mysterious man who posed as her husband?”

“None whatever.”

For some time Jack Durnford smoked in silence, and I could just distinguish his white, hard face in the faint light, for it was now late, and the big electric lamps had been turned out and we were in semi-darkness.

“That fellow shall never marry Muriel,” he declared in a fierce, hoarse voice.  “What you have just told me reveals the truth.  Did you meet Chater?”

“He appeared suddenly at Rannoch, and the Leithcourts fled precipitately and have not since been heard of.”

“Ah, no wonder!” he remarked with a dry laugh.  “No wonder!  But look here, Gordon, I’m not going to stand by and let that scoundrel Woodroffe marry Muriel.”

“You love her, perhaps?” I hazarded.

“Yes, I do love her,” he admitted.  “And, by heaven!” he cried, “I will tell the truth and crush the whole of their ingenious plot.  Have you met Elma Heath?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said in quick anxiety.

“Then listen,” he said in a low, earnest voice.  “Listen, and I’ll tell you something.

“There is a greater mystery surrounding that yacht, the Lola, than you have ever imagined, my dear old chap,” declared Jack Durnford, looking me straight in the face.  “When you told me about it on the quarter-deck that day outside Leghorn, I was half a mind to tell you what I knew.  Only one fact prevented me—­my disinclination to reveal my own secrets.  I loved Muriel Leithcourt, yet, afloat as I was, I could never see her—­I could not obtain from her own lips the explanation I desired.  Yet I would not prejudge her—­no, and I won’t now!” he added with a fierce resolution.

“I love her,” he went on, “and she reciprocates my love.  Ours is a secret engagement made in Malta two years ago, and yet you tell me that she has pledged herself to that fellow Woodroffe—­the man known here in London as Dick Archer.  I can’t believe it—­I really can’t, old fellow.  She could never write to me as she has done, urging patience and secrecy until my return.”