"I do not know, though he said something about the French coast, and afterwards, the Tyrol. Why do you ask? "Why do I ask? Why? Because I must go also! I have to stand face to face with him, and be able to convince myself that either I have made some strange mistake, or that I am right." "And--if you are right?" "Then I have to take him to the nearest prison, or, if he resists, to kill him." "You will do that?" "I will do anything necessary to prevent him ever escaping me again." They talked on into the night, and Señor Guffanta extracted from the other a promise that he would lend him any assistance in his power, and that, above all, he would say nothing to Lord Penlyn that, by being retold to Smerdon, should, if he were actually the murderer, help him to still longer escape. "I promise you," Stuart said, "and the more willingly because I myself would give him up to justice if I were sure he is the man. But that, of course, I cannot be; it is you alone who can identify this cruel murderer. But, in one thing I _am_ sure you are wrong." "In what thing?" "In thinking that Lord Penlyn is in the slightest way an accomplice, or suspects Smerdon at all. If he did so suspect him, I believe that he would himself cause him to be arrested, even though they are such friends." "What motive would Smerdon have to kill Walter except to remove him from the other's path? Do you think he would have done it without consulting Lord Penlyn?" "I am certain that if he did do it, as you think----" "As I am as convinced as that we are sitting here!" "Well, then I am certain that Lord Penlyn knows nothing of it. He is hasty and impetuous, but he is the soul of honour." "Perhaps," Guffanta said; "it may be so. But it is not with him that I have to deal. It is with the man who struck the blow. And it is him I go to seek." "How will you find him?" "Through you. You will find out for me where he is gone with his father--if this is not a lie invented to aid his further escape--and you will let me know everything. Is it not so?" "Yes," Stuart said; "I myself swore that I would find the murderer if I could; but, as I cannot do that, I will endeavour to help you to do so. How shall I communicate with you?" "Write, or come to the 'Hôtel Lepanto.' And when you once tell me where that man is, there I shall soon be afterwards. Even though he should go to the end of the world, I will follow him." Then Señor Guffanta went back to his hotel, and told Diaz Zarates that he should soon be leaving his house. "I have to make a little tour upon the Continent, and I may go at any moment." "On a tour of pleasure, Señor?" the landlord asked. "No! on a voyage of importance!" And three days afterwards he went. A letter had come to him from Stuart saying: