The door of the first room was ajar, though scarce perceptibly so. A dim ray of light struggled through, as if seeking to disclose some ghastly secret. A silence as of the grave reigned. Apparently not a living creature was within the apartments. Paul Desfrayne paused for a minute or two before entering. A strange, painful foreboding seized him. What he feared he dared not admit to himself. What if that woman--Lucia Guiscardini--had come hither with some sinister motive, and had slain her husband in one of her almost ungovernable fits of passion? But no, it could not be. What end could she hope to gain? She valued her own safety, her own ease; she prized this beautiful and splendid world too highly to let her temper carry her to such a dangerous extreme. Gilardoni had fallen asleep. The hour was late, and he was, no doubt, weary with waiting. Taking up the heavy lamp, Paul held it above his head as he entered the second chamber, which was a sitting-room. Directly opposite to the door, in an oblique direction, was a couch, the first object on which Captain Desfrayne’s eyes rested. At full length upon this couch, in an attitude that seemed to indicate the young man was enjoying an easy sleep, lay Leonardo Gilardoni. Paul Desfrayne placed the lamp on a side table, and then said rather loudly: “Gilardoni, my good fellow!” The recumbent figure made no sign of awaking. Paul Desfrayne, seriously uneasy, but still fighting with his fears, crossed the room, and placed a hand on the sleeper’s shoulder. “Gilardoni, awake!” he said, in a voice which, spite of his effort at self-constraint, trembled. Not the faintest sound issued from the pallid lips. Not a movement showed the smallest sign of life. Paul Desfrayne at last placed the palm of his hand upon the temples of the apparently sleeping man. They were almost ice-cold. The young officer caught the hands lying outstretched on either side the silent, rigid form, and felt for the pulse, his heart throbbing so violently as well-nigh to suffocate him. With a groan of despair, he dropped the cold hands. Leonardo Gilardoni was dead. One cruel touch had sent him from the world--one touch of those delicate waxen fingers he had loved so much and kissed with transport so often--one little stroke from the hand of the woman he had so fatally wasted his heart upon, the wife he had idolized, for whom he would have laid down his life willingly in the days of his fond, blind worship. Only too truly did Paul Desfrayne now understand the meaning of that woman’s mysterious presence here. But why had she come--for what reason had she risked her very life--what advantage did she promise herself from this horrible deed? It was absolutely impossible she could have heard anything of the projected search for her brother. The only idea he could conjure up was that the Padre Josef was on his way back to Europe. CHAPTER XXVI. LUCIA GUISCARDINI’S DIAMOND RING.