An hour later General St. George, accompanied by his nephew, and followed by Mr. Drayton and Sergeant Whiffins, set out for the Church of San Michele. As they walked through the grounds of the villa, they passed the yew-tree under which sat Richard Dering in a basket chair, deep in his Italian studies. The General halted for a moment. “I suppose you don’t care to go with us, Richard?” he said. “No, thank you, uncle,” answered Richard. “I have been there once this morning already, and I shall go again, alone, before the day is over.” The General passed on. Richard bowed to Mr. Drayton and Sergeant Whiffins, who eyed him curiously, and then went on with his reading. The Church of San Michele proved to be a building of fine architectural proportions, dating from the end of the fifteenth century. Underneath it were row after row of spacious vaults: in one corner of which, on a slab of dark-blue slate, partly covered with a velvet pall, and with two tall wax tapers burning at its head, they found the object of their search. General St. George went forward and stationed himself at the head of the coffin. Mr. Drayton took up a position on one side of it, and Mr. Whiffins on the other. But Kester lingered in the background among the shadows of the crypt. It seemed as if his feet refused to drag him any nearer. Drayton and Whiffins had seen death often, and in various forms. They were men not easily impressed; but there was something in the circumstances and surroundings of the present case that appealed to them with more than ordinary force. There, before them, lay the lifeless body of the man who had escaped so strangely from their clutches; on whose head a price had been set; who had broken his heart in a vain struggle against the destiny which had crushed him down; and who had now escaped from them again, and this time for ever. Did the red right hand of a murderer lie in that coffin, or was it really as guiltless of the stain of blood as the dead man himself had asseverated; and as those who knew him best had been ready to swear? Could those white lips but have spoken now, could they have given utterance to but one word from beyond the confines of the grave, surely the truth would have been proclaimed. But not till the great day of all would their awful silence ever be broken. Drayton and Whiffins, drawing nearer to the coffin, gazed down through the glass plate at the immovable features underneath. Kester, leaning against one of the cold stone pillars, shuddered, but drew no nearer. Beyond the faint circle of light which radiated from the tapers, all was obscurity and gloom the most profound. Far away among the black recesses of those far-reaching aisles, among those endless rows of time-stained pillars, he heard, or seemed to hear, faint chill whisperings as from lips long dead, and the all but inaudible rustle of ghostly garments sweeping slowly across the floor.