“A week later, while living in the palace at Helsingfors, I overheard a conversation between the Governor-General and his son, which revealed to me a staggering truth that I had never suspected.  It was Oberg himself who had denounced my mother to the Minister of the Interior, and had made those cruel, baseless charges against her!  Then I discerned the reason.  She being exiled, her fortune, as well as that of my father, came to me.  The reason they were scheming for Michael to marry me was in order to obtain control of my money.  I saw at once how helpless I was in the hands of that unscrupulous pair, and I recognized, too, sufficient of the Baron’s methods as ‘The Strangler of Finland,’ to show me what kind of character he was beneath that calm, eminently respectable black-coated exterior.  After deliberately sending my poor mother to Siberia, he had assumed the role of my guardian in order that he might, when I came of age, obtain control of my inheritance, the idea no doubt being that I should marry Michael, and then, after the necessary legal formalities, I should, on a trumped-up charge of conspiracy, share the same fate as my mother had done.”

“The infernal scoundrel!” I ejaculated, when I read her words, while from Jack, who had been looking over my shoulder, escaped a fierce and forcible vow of vengeance.

“The Baron took me with him to Petersburg when he went on official business, and we remained there nearly a month,” the narrative went on.  “While there I received a secret message from ‘The Red Priest,’ the unseen and unknown power of Nihilism, who has for so many years baffled the police.  I went to see him, and he revealed to me how Oberg had contrived to have my mother banished upon a false charge.  He warned me against the man who had pretended to be my father’s friend, and also told me that he had known my father intimately, and that if I got into any further difficulty I was to communicate with him and he would assist me.  Oberg took me back to Helsingfors a few months later, and in summer we went to England.  He was a marvelously clever diplomatist.  His tactics he could change at will.  When I was at school he was rough and brutal in his manner towards me, as he was to all; but now he seemed to be endeavoring to inspire my confidence by treating me with kindly regard and pleasant affability.

“In London, at Claridge’s, we met my old schoolfellow Muriel and her father—­a friend of Oberg’s—­and in response to their invitation went for a cruise on their yacht, the Iris, from Southampton.  Our party was a very pleasant one, and included Woodroffe and Chater, while our cruise across the Bay of Biscay and along the Portuguese coast proved most delightful.  One night, while we were lying outside Lisbon, Woodroffe and Chater, together with Olinto, went ashore, and when they returned in the early hours of the morning they awoke me by crossing the deck above my head.  Then I heard someone outside my cabin-door working as though with a screwdriver,