To-day I have had a curious interview. Who should call on me but the father of the hapless Harry Robinson. My first question was a natural one. How on earth did he connect me with the death of his son? How did he contrive to identify me as the befriender of the young Turkish girl whose interests, he declared, were the object of his visit? It appeared that the police had given him the necessary information, my adventures at Waterloo having rendered their tracing of Carlotta an easy matter. I had been wondering somewhat at the meagre newspaper reports of the inquest. No mention was made, as I had nervously anticipated, of the mysterious lady for whom the deceased had bought a ticket at Alexandretta, and with whom he had come ashore. Very little evidence appeared to have been taken, and the jury contented themselves with giving the usual verdict of temporary insanity. I touched on this as delicately as I could. “We succeeded in hushing things up,” said my visitor, an old man with iron-grey whiskers and a careworn sensitive face. “I have some influence myself, and his wife’s relations--” “His wife!” I ejaculated. The ways of men are further than ever from interpretation. The fellow was actually married! “Yes,” he sighed. “That is what would have made such a terrible scandal. Her relatives are powerful people. We averted it, thank Heaven, and his poor wife will never know. My boy is dead. No public investigation into motives would bring him back to life again.” I murmured words of condolence. “He must have been out of his mind, poor lad, when he induced the girl to run away with him. But, as my son has ruined her,” he set his teeth as if the boy’s sin stabbed him, “I must look after her welfare.” “You may set your mind at rest on that point,” said I. “He smuggled her at once aboard the ship, and seems scarcely to have said how d’ye do to her afterwards. That is the mad part of it.” “Can I be sure?” “I would stake my life on it,” said I. “How do you know?” “Frankness--I may say embarrassing frankness is one of the young lady’s drawbacks.” He looked greatly relieved. I acquainted him with Carlotta’s antecedents, and outlined the part I had played in the story. “Then,” said he, “I will see the child back to her home. I will take her there myself. I cannot allow you any longer to have the burden of befriending her, when it is my duty to repair my boy’s wrongdoing.” I explained to him the terror of Hamdi Effendi’s clutches, and told him of my promise. “Then what is to be done?” he asked. “If any kind people could be found to receive her into their family, and bring her up like a Christian, I should hand her over with the greatest of pleasure. If there is one thing I do not require in this house, it is an idle and irresponsible female. But philanthropists are rare. Who will take her?” “I’m afraid I’m not prepared to do that.”