“Then the name and appearance of the yacht was altered on the voyage, and it became the Lola,” I said.

“No doubt,” he smiled.  “The Iris was a steamer of many names, and had, I believe, been painted nearly all the colors of the rainbow at various times.  It was a mysterious vessel, but she exists no more.  They scuttled her somewhere up in the Baltic, I’ve heard.”

“And who is this Oberg?” I inquired, urging him to reveal to me all he knew concerning him.

“He stands in great fear of the poor young lady, I believe, for it was at his instigation that Leithcourt and his friends took her on that fatal yachting cruise.”

“And what was your connection with them?”

“Well, I was Leithcourt’s servant,” was his reply.  “I was steward on the Iris for a year, until I suppose they thought that I began to see too much, and then I was placed in a position ashore.”

“And what did you see?”

“More than I care to tell, signore.  If they were arrested I should be arrested, too, you see.”

“But I mean to solve this mystery, Olinto,” I said fiercely, for I was in no trifling mood.  “I’ll fathom it if it costs me my life.”

“If the signore solves it himself, then I cannot be charged with revealing the truth,” was the man’s diplomatic reply.  “But I fear that they are far too wary.”

“Armida has lost her life.  Surely that is sufficient incentive for you to bring them all to justice?”

“Of course.  But if the law falls upon them, it will also fall upon me.”

I explained the terrible affliction to which my love had been subjected by those heartless brutes, whereupon he cried enthusiastically: 

“Then she is not dead!  She can tell us everything!”

“But cannot you tell us?”

“No; not all.  The secret she knows has never been revealed.  They feared she might be incautious, and for that reason Oberg made the villainous suggestion of the yachting trip.  She was to be drowned—­accidentally, of course.”

“She is in St. Petersburg now.  I left her a week ago.”

“In Russia!  Ah, signore, for her sake, don’t allow the young lady to remain there.  The Baron is all-powerful.  He does what he wishes in Russia, and the more merciless he is to the people he governs, the greater rewards he receives from the Czar.  I have never been in Russia, but surely it must be a strange country, signore!”

“Well,” I said, sitting upon the edge of the bed and looking at him.  “Are you prepared to denounce them if I bring the Signorina Heath here, to England?”

“But what is the use, if we have no clear proof?” was his evasive reply.  I could see plainly that he feared being himself implicated in some extraordinary plot, the exact nature of which he so steadfastly refused to reveal to me.

We talked on for fully half an hour, and from his conversation I gathered that he was well acquainted with Elma.