The bright May sun was pouring into Tom Pargeter's large smoking-room, making more alive and vivid the fantastic and brilliantly-coloured posters lining the walls.

Laurence Vanderlyn, standing there in a peopled solitude, caught a glimpse of his own strained and tired face in a mirror which filled up the space between two windows, and what he saw startled him, for it seemed to him that none could look at his countenance and not see written there the tale of his anguish, remorse, and suspense. And yet he knew that now his ordeal was drawing to a close; in a few moments Pargeter was due to return from his interview with Madame d'Elphis.

Walking up and down the sunny room which held for him such agonising memories of the long hours spent there during the last three days in Tom Pargeter's company, Vanderlyn lived again every moment of his own strange interview with the soothsayer. The impression of sincerity which Madame d'Elphis had produced on him had now had time to fade, and he asked himself with nervous dread whether she was, after all, likely to do what she had promised. Nay, was it in her power to lie,—or rather to tell the half-truth which was all that he had asked her to tell?

At last there came the sound of the front-door of the villa opening, shutting; and then those made by Pargeter's quick, short footsteps striking the marble floor of the hall, and echoing through the silent house.

Vanderlyn stopped short in his restless pacing. He turned and waited.

The door was flung open, and Pargeter came in. Quietly shutting the door behind him, he walked down the room to where the other man, with his back to the window, stood waiting for him. The three days and nights which had carved indelible lines on the American's already seamed face, had left Pargeter's untouched; just now he looked grave, subdued, but his face had lost the expression of perplexed anger and anxiety which had alone betrayed the varying emotions he had experienced since the disappearance of his wife.

At last, when close to Vanderlyn, he spoke—in a low, gruff whisper. "Grid!" he exclaimed, "Grid, old man, don't be shocked! La d'Elphis says that Peggy's dead—that she's been dead three days!"

Vanderlyn could not speak. He stared dumbly at the other, and as he realised the relief, almost the joy, in Pargeter's voice, there came over him a horrible impulse to strike—and then to flee.

"There, you can see it for yourself—" Pargeter held out, with fingers twitching with excitement, a sheet of note-paper. "La d'Elphis wrote it all down! I didn't see her—she's ill. But this is not the first time I've had to work her in that way, and it does just as well. Her sister managed everything,—she took her in one of Peggy's gloves which I'd brought with me."

Vanderlyn shuddered. He opened his mouth, but no words would come. Then he looked down at the sheet of paper Pargeter had handed him:—

Pargeter laid one hand on Vanderlyn's arm—with the other he took out of one of his pockets a sheaf of thin slips of paper. The American knew them to contain accounts of accidents and untoward occurrences registered at the Prefecture of Police.

Pargeter detached one of the slips and laid it across the sheet of paper on which Madame d'Elphis had written her laconic message:—

"Look—look at this, Grid! And don't say again I'm a fool for believing in La d'Elphis! I've had this since the day before yesterday; but I didn't bother to show it to you, for I didn't think anything of it—I shouldn't now, but for La d'Elphis! But do look—'the body of a young, fair woman found in a train at Orange,'—'the bridal flower,' as La d'Elphis says—eh, what?"

But still Vanderlyn did not speak.

"I've thought it all out," Pargeter went on, excitedly. "Peggy was driven to the wrong station—see? Got into the wrong train—and then—then, Grid, when she found out what she'd done, she got upset——" For the first time a note of awe, of horror, came into his voice—"You see, my sister Sophy was right, after all; the poor girl's heart was queer!"

"And what are you going to do now?" asked Vanderlyn in a low, dry tone. "Arrange for a special to Orange, I suppose? What time will you start, Tom? Would you like me to come with you?"

Pargeter reddened; his green eye blinked as if he felt suddenly blinded by the bright sun.

"I'm not thinking of going myself," he said, rather ashamedly. "Where would be the good of it? Her brother and that cousin of hers are sure to want to go. They can take Plimmer. The truth is—well, old man, I don't feel up to it! I've always had an awful horror of death. Peggy knew that well enough——" the colour faded from his face; he looked at the other with a nervous, dejected expression.

"Tom," said Vanderlyn, slowly, "why shouldn't I go to Orange—with Madame de LÉra? Why say anything to Peggy's people till we really know?"

For the first time Pargeter seemed moved to genuine human feeling. "Well," he said, "you are a good friend, Grid! I'll never forget how you've stood by me during this worrying time. I wish I could do something for you in return——" he looked at the other doubtfully. To poor Tom Pargeter, "doing something" always meant parting with money, and Laurence Vanderlyn was, if not rich, then quite well off.

Vanderlyn's hand suddenly shook. He dropped the piece of paper he had been holding. "Perhaps you'll let me have Jasper sometimes—in the holidays," he said, huskily.

"Lord, yes! Of course I will! There's nothing would please poor Peggy more! Then—then when will you start, Grid? I mean for Orange?"

"At once," said Vanderlyn. Then he looked long, hesitatingly at Pargeter, and the millionaire, with most unusual perspicacity, read and answered the question contained in that strange, uncertain gaze.

"Don't bring her back, Grid! I couldn't stand a big funeral here. I don't want to hear any more about it than I can help! Of course, it isn't much good my going over to England now; but I won't stay in Paris, I'll get away,—right away for a bit, on the yacht,—and take some of the crowd with me."

No one ever knew the truth. To the Prefect of Police the mystery of the disappearance of Mrs. Pargeter is still unsolved—unsolvable. When he meets a pretty woman out at dinner he tells her the story—and asks her what she thinks.

As for Laurence Vanderlyn, he has gone home—home to the old colonial house which was built by his great-grandfather, the friend of Franklin, on the shores of Lake Champlain. He never speaks of Peggy excepting to Jasper; but to the lad he sometimes talks of her as if she were still there, still very near to them both, near enough to be grieved if her boy should ever forget that he had a mother who loved him dearly.

THE END.