"Do you yourself think so?" I inquired, looking earnestly into those bright eyes of clear, childlike blue, that were so plainly indicative of a purity of soul. "Well, I scarcely know," she responded, returning my glance unflinchingly. "We all of us have some little mystery or other in our lives, I suppose." I had taken her hand in adieu, and was still holding it. "And are you no exception?" "Ah! now, Doctor, you're really too inquisitive." And she laughed, just a trifle unnaturally I thought, as though I had approached an unwelcome topic. "Well," I said smiling, "I won't press you further; it isn't fair. Good-bye, and I trust I shall meet both your cousin and yourself at a date not far distant--that is, if I am still in town." "Oh, I hope you will be!" exclaimed her ladyship; "I can't think why doctors go and bury themselves in the country." "There are just as many patients in the country districts as in the towns," I responded. "And in the country one carries on one's profession amid more congenial surroundings." I repeated my farewells, and, with a final and longing glance at my mysterious wife, went forth into the hall, and was let out by the liveried servant. To approach my wife boldly and demand the truth was, I saw, useless. First I must, by my own careful observation, establish her identity with Beryl Wynd, and, secondly, clear up the mystery of how a woman could be dead and yet still live. The expression of those clear, honest eyes, the form of the beautiful face, as flawless as that of Titian's "Flora" in the Tribune of the Uffizzi, the unusual tint of that gold-brown hair were all unmistakable. They set at rest any doubt which arose within me that the woman whose hand I had held was not the same upon whose finger I had placed the wedding-ring. Incredible though it seemed, I had that morning spoken with my unknown wife, and she had not known me. We were strangers, yet united in matrimony. Mechanically I walked towards Kensington Church in order to take the omnibus back to Hammersmith. My mind was filled with the mystery of my marriage and the reason why the sum of twenty-five thousand pounds had been offered me if I would consent to secretly kill my bride. Certain it was that I had been the victim of a cunningly devised plot, and further, that the fact of my return to London was known to those who had conspired against me. Therefore, it behoved me to exercise considerable care and caution in the prosecution of my inquiries. The two scoundrels, Wyndham Wynd and Major Tattersett, must, I resolved, be discovered at all hazards, while I must also leave no stone unturned to find out the house in which the marriage had taken place. The man Wynd had intended that my wife should die, but it was plain that, by some good fortune, she had escaped him. Yet the most curious phase of the affair was that she appeared utterly unconscious of it all.