"Now, listen. In a little more than a week it will be New Year's day. On that day there will arrive for me a card of greeting. You will open all my letters on that morning, and find it. Either it will be perfectly plain and bear the words 'A Happy New Year' in frosted letters, or else it will be a water-colour snow scene--a house, bare trees, moonlight, you know the kind of thing--with the words 'The Compliments of the Season.' Upon either will be written in violet ink, in a woman's hand, the words in English, 'To dear Heinrich.' You understand, eh?" "Perfectly, sir." "Good," he said. "Now, I gave you two telegrams before I left. If the card is a plain one, burn it and despatch the first telegram; if coloured, then send the second message. Do you follow?" I replied in the affirmative, when, to my surprise he rose, and instead of entering his bedroom to wash, he simply swallowed a second glass of brandy, sighed, and departed, saying: "Remember, you know nothing--nothing whatever. If there should be any inquiries about me, keep your mouth closed." Twice my friend Stieber called in the days that followed, but I flattered myself that from me he learnt nothing. On the morning of New Year's day five letters were pushed through the box. Eagerly I tore them open. The last, bearing a Dutch stamp, with the postmark of Utrecht, contained the expected card, with the inscription "To dear Heinrich," a small hand-painted scene upon celluloid, with forget-me-nots woven round the words "With the Compliments of the Season." Half an hour later, having burned the card according to my instructions, I despatched the mysterious message to Manchester. That evening, about ten o'clock, Stieber called for me to go for a stroll and drink a New Year health. But as we turned from Clarges Street into Piccadilly I could have sworn that a man we passed in the darkness was old Van Nierop. I made no remark, however, because I did not wish to draw my companion's attention to the shuffling old fellow. Had the telegram, I wondered, brought him to London? Ten minutes later, in the Café Monico, my friend Karl lifted his glass to me, saying: "Well, a Happy New Year, my dear friend. Take my advice, and don't trust your Baron too implicitly." "What do you mean?" I asked. "You always speak in enigmas!" But he laughed, and would say no more. Next day dawned. Grey and muddy, it was rendered more dismal by my loneliness. I idled away the morning, anxious to be travelling again, but at noon there was a caller, a thin, pale-faced girl of fifteen or so, poorly dressed and evidently of the working-class. When, in response to her question, I had told her my name, she said: "I've been sent by the Baron to tell you he wishes to see you very particularly to-night at nine o'clock, at this address." She handed me an envelope with an address upon it, and then went down the stairs. The address I read was: "4A Bishop's Lane, Chiswick."