enclosure unopened, until nine o'clock to-morrow
morning. If you do not hear from me, or see
me, before that time, break the seal when the
clock strikes, and read the contents." I added
my initials; and protected the whole by enclosing
it in a second sealed envelope, addressed to Pesca
at his lodgings.

Nothing remained to be done after this, but
to find the means of sending my letter to its
destination immediately. I should then have
accomplished all that lay in my power. If
anything happened to me in the Count's house, I
had now provided for his answering it with his
life. That the means of preventing his escape
under any circumstances whatever, were at
Pesca's disposal, if he chose to exert them, I did
not for an instant doubt. The extraordinary
anxiety which he had expressed to remain
unenlightened as to the Count's identity—or, in
other words, to be left uncertain enough about
facts to justify him to his own conscience in
remaining passive—betrayed plainly that the
means of exercising the terrible justice of the
Brotherhood were ready to his hand, although,
as a naturally humane man, he had shrunk from
plainly saying as much in my presence. The
deadly certainty with which the vengeance of
foreign political societies can hunt down a traitor
to the cause, hide himself where he may, had
been too often exemplified, even in my
superficial experience, to allow of any doubt.
Considering the subject only as a reader of
newspapers, cases recurred to my memory, both in
London and in Paris, of foreigners found stabbed
in the streets, whose assassins could never be
traced—of bodies and parts of bodies, thrown
into the Thames and the Seine, by hands that
could never be discovered—of deaths by secret
violence which could only be accounted for in
one way. I have disguised nothing relating to
myself in these pages—and I do not disguise
here—that I believed I had written Count
Fosco's death-warrant, if the fatal emergency
happened which authorised Pesca to open my
enclosure.

I left my room to go down to the groundfloor
of the house, and speak to the landlord
about finding me a messenger. He
happened to be ascending the stairs at the time,
and we met on the landing. His son, a
quick lad, was the messenger he proposed to
me, on hearing what I wanted. We had the
boy upstairs; and I gave him his directions.
He was to take the letter in a cab, to put it
into Professor Pesca's own hands, and to bring
me back a line of acknowledgment from that
gentleman; returning in the cab, and keeping
it at the door for my use. It was then nearly
half-past ten. I calculated that the boy might
be back in twenty minutes; and that I might
drive to St. John's Wood, on his return, in
twenty minutes more.

When the lad had departed on his errand, I
returned to my own room for a little while, to
put certain papers in order, so that they might
be easily found, in case of the worst. The key
of the old-fashioned bureau in which the papers
were kept, I sealed up, and left it on my table,
with Marian's name written on the outside of
the little packet. This done, I went downstairs
to the sitting-room, in which I expected to find
Laura and Marian awaiting my return from
the Opera. I felt my hand trembling for
the first time, when I laid it on the lock of the
door.

No one was in the room but Marian. She
was reading; and she looked at her watch, in
surprise, when I came in.

"How early you are back!" she said. " You
must have come away before the opera was
over."

"Yes," I replied; " neither Pesca nor I
waited for the end. Where is Laura?"

"She had one of her bad headaches this
evening; and I advised her to go to bed, when
we had done tea."

I left the room again, on the pretext of wishing
to see whether Laura was asleep. Marian's
quick eyes were beginning to look inquiringly
at my face; Marian's quick instinct was
beginning to discover that I had something weighing
on my mind.

When I entered the bed-chamber, and softly
approached the bedside by the dim flicker of the
night—lamp, my wife was asleep.

We had not been married quite a month yet.
If my heart was heavy, if my resolution for a
moment faltered again, when I looked at her
face turned faithfully to my pillow in her sleep
, when I saw her hand resting open on the coverlid,
as if it was waiting unconsciously for mine,
surely there was some excuse for me? I only
allowed myself a few minutes to kneel down at
the bedside, and to look close at her—so close
that her breath, as it came and went fluttered
on my face. I only touched her hand and her
cheek with my lips, at parting. She stirred in
her sleep, and murmured my name—but without
waking. I lingered for an instant at the door
to look at her again. " God bless and keep
you, my darling!" I whispered—and left her.

Marian was at the stair-head waiting for me.
She had a folded slip of paper in her hand.

"The landlord's son has brought this for
you," she said. " He has got a cab at the door
—he says you ordered him to keep it at your
disposal."

"Quite right, Marian. I want the cab; I am
going out again."

I descended the stairs as I spoke, and looked
into the sitting-room to read the slip of paper by
the light on the table. It contained these two
sentences, in Pesca's handwriting:

"Your letter is received. If I don't see you
before the time you mention, I will break the
seal when the clock strikes."

I placed the paper in my pocket-book and
made for the door. Marian met me on the
threshold, and pushed me back into the room
where the candlelight fell full on my face. She
held me by both hands, and her eyes fastened
searchingly on mine.

"I see!" she said, in a low eager whisper.
"You are trying the last chance: to-night."