Sweeping the bundled bills into the portmanteau, and then locking up the great wallet of cheques, Randall Clayton absently shook hands with the fidgety old accountant, now eager for his leave. "Must catch my train. Take care of yourself," was Somers' hearty adieu, as he vanished with his ten-year-old umbrella in hand. Clayton walked across the hall, with the concealed fortune locked in the travelling bag, and then remembered his pistol thrown into his desk drawer. He had just slipped it in his pocket when Emil Einstein glided into the room. "Come down," he eagerly whispered, "She's there,--and--there's some bad news, I fear." Never waiting for the elevator, Clayton grasped his hat, hastily donning his top-coat, and snatching the bag, cried, "Lock up my desk and keep my keys till I come back. Don't leave; remember!" Everything but Irma Gluyas faded from the excited lover's mind as he saw the portly form of Madam Raffoni lingering in the darkened hallway of the ground-floor entrance. There were tears in the woman's eyes as she sobbed, "She is dying! Kommen sie schnell!" The golden daylight turned to darkness before Clayton's eyes, as he reeled and staggered. Then, a mental flash of hope allured him. "Where?" he hoarsely cried. The woman's jargon made plain that the beautiful singer still lay in the darkened rooms whither his loving arms had borne her. "The carriage, yes; my God, we must hurry!" was Clayton's first returning thought; and then, motioning to the woman to follow, the cashier darted along Fourteenth Street. He was already within the vehicle when Leah Einstein timidly entered. "To the Fulton Ferry. Hurry!" called out the excited Clayton, as the burly policeman drove away a knot of "extra"-peddling urchins. "I can easily reach the bank by two o'clock; they never shut the side doors till three," murmured Clayton, as his eyes rested upon the Russia-leather portmanteau. He instinctively gripped his revolver. It was all right. And then, with a sinking heart, he essayed to gain some connected story of the Magyar songbird's grave peril. But, the woman sobbing there was all too overcome for a connected story. There was only death in the air--there was the open grave yawning for the woman he loved, and the brightness had gone out of Randall Clayton's life forever when, with white lips, he asked himself, "Will we be in time? Irma! My God! Irma, my own darling!" He had only time to dismiss the carriage and drag Madame Raffoni on the ferry-boat when the chains barred out a score of the rushing crowd. Twenty minutes later, his heart beating a funeral knell, Randall Clayton, portmanteau in hand, passed within the portals of the old brownstone mansion. As the woman softly closed the door, which she had opened with a pass-key, she laid her finger on her lip. Then Clayton, on tip-toe, stole softly after her into the darkened chamber where a white-robed form lay motionless on the great canopied bed. CHAPTER VIII.