“It seems a half-mask,” said Henry, “made of silk; and here are initial letters within it—­M.  B.”

“To what do they apply?”

“Marmaduke Bannerworth, my father.”

“I regret I asked you.”

“Nay, Charles, you need not.  Years have now elapsed since that misguided man put a period to his own existence, in the gardens of Bannerworth Hall.  Of course, the shock was a great one to us all, although I must confess that we none of us knew much of a father’s affections.  But time reconciles one to these dispensations, and to a friend, like yourself, I can talk upon these subjects without a pang.”

He laid down the mask, and proceeded further in his search in the old box.

Towards the bottom of it there were some books, and, crushed in by the side of them, there was an ancient-looking pocket-book, which Charles pointed out, saying,—­

“There, Henry, who knows but you may find a fortune when you least expect it?”

“Those who expect nothing,” said Henry, “will not be disappointed.  At all events, as regards this pocket-book, you see it is empty.”

“Not quite.  A card has fallen from it.”

Charles took up the card, and read upon it the name of Count Barrare.

“That name,” he said, “seems familiar to me.  Ah! now I recollect, I have read of such a man.  He flourished some twenty, or five-and-twenty years ago, and was considered a roue of the first water—­a finished gamester; and, in a sort of brief memoir I read once of him, it said that he disappeared suddenly one day, and was never again heard of.”

“Indeed!  I’m not puzzled to think how his card came into my father’s pocket-book.  They met at some gaming-house; and, if some old pocket-book of the Count Barrare’s were shaken, there might fall from it a card, with the name of Mr. Marmaduke Bannerworth upon it.”

“Is there nothing further in the pocket-book—­no memoranda?”

“I will look.  Stay! here is something upon one of the leaves—­let me see—­’Mem., twenty-five thousand pounds!  He who robs the robber, steals little; it was not meant to kill him:  but it will be unsafe to use the money for a time—­my brain seems on fire—­the remotest hiding-place in the house is behind the picture.”

“What do you think of that?” said Charles.

“I know not what to think.  There is one thing though, that I do know.”

“And what is that?”

“It is my father’s handwriting.  I have many scraps of his, and his peculiar hand is familiar to me.”

“It’s very strange, then, what it can refer to.”

“Charles—­Charles! there is a mystery connected with our fortunes, that I never could unravel; and once or twice it seemed as if we were upon the point of discovering all; but something has ever interfered to prevent us, and we have been thrown back into the realms of conjecture.  My father’s last words were, ‘The money is hidden;’ and then he tried to add something; but death stopped his utterance.  Now, does it not almost seem that this memorandum alluded to the circumstance?”