"No. It has not been in my possession," I answered, leaning against my writing-chair for support. "I found it among my wife's letters." "Your wife!" he gasped, agitated. He had turned ghastly pale at mention of her name, and, trembling with agitation, swayed forward. A moment later, however, he recovered his self-possession, clutched at the corner of his table, and regarding me sharply, asked, "What do you suspect?" "I scarce know what to suspect," I answered gravely, striving to remain calm, but remembering at that instant the curious effect produced upon the Foreign Minister when he had first seen Ella dancing at the Embassy ball. My declaration that I had found this official bond of nations in her possession had produced a similar disquieting result which puzzled me. "But surely she can have had no hand in the affair," he cried. "She certainly did not strike me as an adventuress, or an agent of the Tzar's secret service." "It is a problem that I cannot solve," I exclaimed slowly, watching the strange, haggard look upon his usually imperturbable features. "After leaving you this evening I went home only to find a letter of farewell from her, and--" "She has fled, then!" he exclaimed, with quick suspicion. "Yes. Her flight was evidently pre-arranged, and curiously enough her mother, who lives in Pont Street, has discharged her servants, disposed of a good deal of her property, and also departed." "Gone together, no doubt," the Earl observed, frowning reflectively. "But is it not very strange that she should have left the stolen convention behind? Surely if my wife were actually a Russian agent she would never have been guilty of such indiscretion," I said. "The mystery is inexplicable, Deedes," he declared, with a heavy look, half of pain, half of bewilderment. "Absolutely inexplicable." This aged man, to whose firmness, clever statesmanship, and calm foresight England owed her place as foremost among the Powers, was trembling with an excitement he strove in vain to suppress. In manner that surprised me, his cold, cynical face relaxed, and placing his thin, bony hand upon my shoulder with fatherly tenderness, Her Majesty's most trusted Minister urged me to confide in him all my suspicions and my fears.