he will be bludgeoned on the street some dark night, or involved in a one-sided duel.  Twice I have rescued him from an imminent danger which he has not even seen.  Once in a restaurant a group of officers, apparently drunk, picked a quarrel and drew swords upon him.  I had the less difficulty in getting him away because he fears a broil, or anything that will call down upon him the attention of his wooden-headed cousin in the Embassy.  On another occasion as we were coming home toward midnight, a perfectly bogus brawl broke out suddenly all around us.  Drummond was unarmed, but his huge fists sent sprawling two or three of his assailants.  I had a revolver, and held the rest off, and so we escaped.  I wish he was safely back in London again.’  What do you think of that, Dorothy?”

“I think exactly what Mr. Lamont thinks.  Lieutenant Drummond’s mission to Russia seems to me a journey of folly.”

“After all, I am glad you don’t care, Dorothy.  He should pay attention to what Jack says, for Jack knows Russia, and he doesn’t.  Still, let us hope he will come safely out of St. Petersburg.  And now, Dot, for breakfast, because I must get to work.”

Next morning Dorothy saw a letter for herself on the table in the now familiar hand-writing, and was more relieved than perhaps she would have confessed even to her closest friend, when she saw the twopence-halfpenny English stamp on the envelope.  Yet its contents were startling enough, and this letter she did not read to Katherine Kempt, but bore its anxiety alone.

Dear miss Amhurst: 

I write you in great trouble of mind, not trusting this letter to the Russian post-office, but sending it by an English captain to be posted in London.  Two days ago Jack Lamont disappeared; a disappearance as complete as if he had never existed.  The night before last, about ten o’clock, I thought I heard him come into his shop below my room.  Sometimes he works there till daylight, and as, when absorbed in his experiments, he does not relish interruptions, even from me, I go on with my reading until he comes upstairs.  Toward eleven o’clock I thought I heard slight sounds of a scuffle, and a smothered cry.  I called out to him, but received no answer.  Taking a candle, I went downstairs, but everything was exactly as usual, the doors locked, and not even a bench overturned.  I called aloud, but only the echo of this barn of a room replied.  I lit the gas and made a more intelligent search, but with no result.  I unlocked the door, and stood out in the street, which was quite silent and deserted.  I began to doubt that I had heard anything at all, for, as I have told you, my nerves lately have been rather prone to the jumps.  I sat up all night waiting for him, but he did not come.  Next day I went, as had been previously arranged, to the Foreign Office, but was kept waiting in an anteroom for two hours, and then told that the Minister could not see