and a young man passing on a bicycle very kindly offered to change the cover for me. He was a rather good-looking young fellow and evidently a gentleman. A week later we met again at a party at Belton, when I discovered that his name was Arthur Rumbold, and that he was son of Canon Rumbold, of Lincoln, who held the living of Folkingham. He was a medical student at Guy's, and home for the vacation. We met again and accidentally, at a dance in town; and although I am no more of a flirt than other girls, I confess that he attracted me. In fact, after a couple of months he fell desperately in love with me, when suddenly I discovered a most amazing and alarming fact, namely, that he actually occupied furnished rooms in the same house in Vincent Square, Westminster, where lodged Ralph Vickers. He knew the fellow well, he said, but was unaware, of course, of how he lived. "Meanwhile," she went on, her face slightly flushed by the effort of speaking, "Vickers was constantly pressing me for more money, threatening that if he did not get it he would hand me over to the French police. I was desperate, and at last one dark winter's night, when walking with Arthur in one of the quiet streets in Kensington where we would not be recognised, I made a clean breast of my girlish foolishness and my present difficulties. He promised to at once help me, but it was three weeks afterwards when he wrote to me while I was at Ryhall, saying that he had searched the rooms of his fellow-lodger, had found my letters, and was bringing them to me. He had, he said, secretly watched Vickers, and found that he was in association with Parham, Winsloe and Domville in a great ruthless conspiracy of blackmail, and further that he had seen persons enter the house in Clipstone Street and never emerge again! Think of the effect this amazing statement had upon me. Winsloe and Domville were our guests at that moment, and the last-named was your most intimate friend. Three days previously I had received a letter from Vickers demanding that I should meet him in secret in the park, and I had replied making an evening appointment. Then, to Arthur I replied that I would meet him in the afternoon in Charlton Wood, a lonely spot where we had met before, telling him to bring the letters, and to explain everything to me. Well," she said hoarsely, after a pause, "we met. He told me of his suspicion of that house in Clipstone Street and I at once saw to what dastardly use had been put the information regarding certain persons which these men had forced from me. But as he was telling me the truth a man rushed wildly out from the trees and sprang between us threatening to kill him if he uttered another word. He naturally defied his assailant, who in a moment drew a revolver and shot him dead before my eyes. Then turning to me the assassin said, calmly, `Of this affair you know nothing, remember. Otherwise, you'll quickly find yourself arrested for the affair in Paris.