"He appeared to labour under considerable
agitation, and opened our interview by bespeaking
my secrecy as to what he was about to
communicate. It was to this purport: A friend of
his own, engaged in the Baltic trade, had just
declared to him that he had seen W., the person
I allude to, alive and well, walking on
the quay at Riga, that he traced him to his lodging,
but, on inquiring for him the next day, he
was not to be found, and it was then ascertained
that he had left the city. W. was, it would
seem, a man easily recognised, and the other
declared that there could not be the slightest
doubt of his identity. The question was a grave
one how to act, since the assurance company
with which his life was insured were actually
engaged in discussing the propriety of some
compromise by paying to the family a moiety of
the policy, and a variety of points arose out of
this contingency; for while it would have been
a great cruelty to have conveyed hopes to the
family that might, by possibility, not be realised,
yet, on the other hand, to have induced them to
adopt a course on the hypothesis of his death when
they believed him still living, was almost as bad.

"I thought for a long while over the matter,
and with my sister's counsel to aid me, I
determined that we should come abroad and seek
out this man, trusting that, if we found him,
we could induce him to accept of the legacy
which his family rejected. We obtained every
clue we could think of to his detection. A
perfect description of him, in voice, look, and
manner; a copy of his portrait, and a specimen
of his handwriting; and then we bethought
ourselves of interesting you in the search. You
were rambling about the world in that idle and
desultory way in which any sort of a pursuit
might be a boon—as often in the by-paths as on
the high roads—you might chance to hit off this
discovery in some remote spot, or, at all events,
find some clue to it. In a word, we grew to
believe, that, with you to aid us, we should get
to the bottom of this mystery; and now that
by a lucky chance we have met you, our hopes
are all the stronger."

"You'll think it strange," said I, "but I
already know something of this story; the man
you allude to was Sir Samuel Whalley.

"How on earth have you guessed that?"

"I came by the knowledge on a railroad
journey, where my fellow-passengers talked over
the event, and I subsequently travelled with Sir
Samuel's daughter, who came abroad to fill the
station of a companion to an elderly lady. She
called herself Miss Herbert."

"Exactly! The widow resumed her family
name after W.'s suicide—if it were a suicide."

"How singular to think that you should
have chanced upon this link of the chain. And
do you know her?"

"Intimately; we were fellow-travellers for
some days."

"And where is she now?"

"She is, at this moment, at a villa on the
Lake of Como, living with a Mrs. Keats, the
sister of her Majesty's Envoy at Kalbbratenstadt."

"You are marvellously accurate in this narrative,
Potts," said he, laughing; " the impression
made on you by this young lady can scarcely
have been a transient one."

I suppose I grew very red—I felt that I was
much confused by this remark—and I turned
away to conceal my emotion. Crofton was too
delicate to take any advantage of my distress,
and merely added:

"From having known her, you will naturally
devote yourself with more ardour to serve her.
May we then count upon your assistance in our
project?"

"That you may," said I. " From this hour,
I devote myself to it."

Crofton at once proposed that I should order
my luggage to be placed on his carriage, and
start off with them; but I firmly opposed this
plan. First of all, I had no luggage, and had no
fancy to confess as much; secondly, I resolved
to give at least one day for Vaterchen's arrival—
I'd have given a month rather than come down
to the dreary thought of his being a knave, and
Tintefleck a cheat! In fact, I felt that if I
were to begin any new project in life with so
black an experience, that every step I took would
be marked with distrust, and tarnished with
suspicion. I therefore pretended to Crofton
that I had given rendezvous to a friend at Lindau,
and could not leave without waiting for
him. I am not very sure that he believed me,
but he was most careful in not dropping a word
that might show incredulity; and once more we
addressed ourselves to the grand project before us.

"Come in, Mary!" cried he, suddenly rising
from his chair, and going to meet her. " Come
in, and help us by your good counsel."

It was not possible to receive me with more
kindness than she showed. Had I been some
old friend who came to meet them there by
appointment, her manner could not have been
more courteous nor more easy; and when she
learned from her brother how warmly I had
associated myself in this plan, she gave me one
of her pleasantest smiles, and said:

"I was not mistaken in you."

With a great map of Europe before us on the
table, we proceeded to plan a future line of
operations. We agreed to take certain places,
each of us, and to meet at certain others, to
compare notes and report progress. We scarcely
permitted ourselves to feel any great confidence
of success, but we all concurred in the notion
that some lucky hazard might do for us more
than all our best-devised schemes could accom-
plish; and, at last, it was settled that, while they
took Southern Germany and the Tyrol, I should
ramble about through Savoy and Upper Italy,
and our meeting-place be in Italy. The great
railway centres, where Englishmen of every class
and gradation were much employed, offered the
best prospect of meeting with the object of our
search, and these were precisely the sort of
places such a man would be certain to resort to.

Our discussion lasted so long, that the
Croftons put off their journey till the following
day, and we dined all together very happily,