"Regret? No," she repeated, raising her beautiful face to mine, perfect in its loveliness and purity. "I do not regret now, Richard--because I love you." And our lips met again in fervent tenderness. "It is still an absolute mystery," I observed at last. "We know that we are wedded, but there our knowledge ends." "We have both been victims of a plot," she responded. "If we could but discern the motive, then we might find some clue to lead us to the truth." "But there is a woman called La Gioia," I said; and, continuing, explained my presence in the park at Whitton, and the conversation I had overheard between herself and Tattersett. Her hand, still in mine, trembled perceptibly, and I saw that I had approached a subject distasteful to her. "Yes," she admitted at last, in a hard, strange voice, "it is true that he wrote making an appointment to meet me in the park that night. I kept it because I wished to ascertain the truth regarding my marriage. But he would tell me nothing; he only urged me to secure my own safety because La Gioia had returned." "And who is La Gioia?" "My enemy--my bitterest enemy." "Can you tell me nothing else?" I asked in a tone of slight reproach. "I know nothing else. I do not know who or what she is, or where she lives. I only know that she is my unseen evil genius." "But you have seen her. She called upon you on that evening at Gloucester Square when she assumed the character of your dressmaker, and a few nights ago she was here--in this house." "Here?" she echoed in alarm. "Impossible!" Then I related how I had seen her, and how her evil influence had fallen upon me when afterwards I had entered my room. "The thing is actually beyond belief," she declared. "Do you really think you were not mistaken?" "Most assuredly I was not. It was the woman who called upon you in London. But you have not told me the reason you were absent from your room that night." She was silent for a few moments, then answered, "I met Tattersett. He demanded that I should meet him, as he wished to speak with me secretly. I did so." "Why did he wish to see you?" "In order to prove to me that he had no hand in the tragic affair at Whitton. I had suspected all along that he was responsible for the Colonel's death, and my opinion has not altered. I begged him to tell me the reason of the plot against me, the motive of my marriage, and the identity of my husband. But he refused point-blank, telling me to ask La Gioia, who knew everything." "Have you no idea of her whereabouts?" "None whatever." "If we could but find her," I said, "she might tell us something. Ah! if we could but find her." My love was trembling. Her heart was filled to overflowing with the mystery of it all. Yet I knew that she loved me--yes, she loved me.