"But, monsieur, isn't the city of Genoa, in Italy, very far from the place where this child puts his father's death?" "Undoubtedly, my friend. I twist the probabilities in order to confirm the fortune-teller's words, and that is a whim for which I give you leave to rebuke me. But open the cupboard in which my brother's cherished records are kept, including that last letter which I have read so many times without fathoming its meaning." "_Mon Dieu_! monsieur," said Adamas, opening the drawer and handing his master the letter, "you divined and understood clearly enough at the time everything that happened and was likely to happen. You heard from Monsieur Florimond very seldom, because of the weighty secret employments he had in the Italian courts, to which his master the Duc de Savoie sent him. He wrote of his journeys without telling you of their object, because he was forbidden to do that by the political party with which he acted, which was not always yours. This last letter tells you of other journeys to be undertaken after that from which he had just returned, and this is what he says to you in his very words: 'If you do not hear of me before autumn, do not be alarmed. My health is good and my personal affairs are not in bad condition.'--The date is evidently accurate, for he begins by saying: 'Monsieur and dear brother, doubtless you received my letter of January last; in the past five months----'" "I know all that, Adamas, I know it by heart; and, nevertheless, when I went to Italy in 1611, to make personal inquiries for that poor brother of mine, from whom I had never heard again, I was told that he had never returned from a mission to Rome, on which he had set out fifteen months before. And, when I went to Rome, he had not been seen there for more than two years. I travelled all over Italy until late in 1612, without finding any trace of him, so that I finally concluded that he must have undertaken some long voyage, to the East or West Indies, on his own account, and that I should see him again some day; but at last I made up my mind that he had certainly been murdered by the brigands who infest Italy, or had perished in a storm at sea. He had not acquired great wealth in the Savoyard's service, although he never complained; and I think that he seldom had companions in his journeys. In the end I lost all hope of finding him, but not of learning his fate and avenging him if he was slain by treachery." While the marquis and Adamas were talking thus, Mario, whose presence they had forgotten, had glided behind the marquis's chair. He listened, and he looked closely at the letter Bois-Doré held in his hands. He could read very well, as we have said, even manuscript; but he was in dire perplexity, fearing lest he should make a mistake and should be accused again of speaking at random.