"Several times. Mr Murray was my father's friend. As you know, he lived at Wichenford, in Worcestershire. Then we went to reside entirely abroad, and for quite a long time, a year or more, I lost sight of her. She was very beautiful. From a child her wonderful face was everywhere admired. In the convent we girls nicknamed her `The Little Madonna,' for she bore a striking likeness to the Van Dyck's Madonna in the Pitti in Florence, a copy of which hung in the convent chapel." "Ah, of course!" I cried. Now that she recalled that picture, I recognised the extraordinary likeness. Perhaps you, who read this chronicle of strange facts, know that small canvas a foot square which hangs in a corner of one of the great gold-ceilinged salons, almost unnoticed save by the foreign art enthusiast. The expression of sweetness and adoration distinguishes it as a marvellous work. "What do you know further concerning her?" I asked. "Tell me all--for she was my friend." "About a year before we went to live at Enghien, near Paris, Mrs Murray died. Then her father let Wichenford Place to an American, and went to Australia for a sea-trip, leaving Ella in charge of an old aunt who lived in London. I saw her once, at her aunt's house in Porchester Terrace. She was very unhappy, and when I asked her the reason she told me in bitter tears that she loved a man who adored her in return. She would not tell me the man's name, but only said that her father and her aunt were compelling her to marry a wealthy elderly man who was odious, and whom she hated. Poor little Ella! I pitied her, and tried to comfort her, but it was quite useless, for that very evening her father, who was then back in London, compelled her to go out and meet her secret lover and give him his _conge_. Who he was or what became of him I do not know. I only know that she loved him as dearly as any woman has ever loved a man--poor little Ella!" I stood before her motionless, listening to those words. Was this true? Had Fate any further shaft of bitterness to thrust into my already broken heart? "Miss Miller!" I managed to exclaim, in a very low voice I fear, "what you tell me is utterly astounding. You know the man who loved Ella Murray. He was none other than myself--I who loved her, ay better than my own life--I who received that dismissal from the sweet lips that I so adored--the lips that I now know were compelled to lie to me." "You--Mr Leaf!" she cried. "Impossible. You were actually Ella's secret lover!"