Evening star., 1896-01-02

without any aid Of ours. It is a pretty bad
business, though, anyway"
I asked him what, and he looked at me
what i. the matter with your You'v.
been queer ever sipse last night" he re-
| turned, peevishly, ana pointed to a huge
headline in his papAF. looked. and read
''The Assassination Sf President sadi-car-
not" For moment my head reeled and
the words daLced unmeaningly before my
eyes. and then a mist feemed to unfold itself
from my brain. and Remembrance of the af-
fair had just beensthrough with came back
to me. unbuttoned my coat, and saw that
was still in evening" dress.
had no little dinculty In persuading Ray
t, tell me what had occurred, and in con-
vincing him that had no recollection of it.
AS he had been diretted, he waited for his
who were in his charge. and he had seen
what took place between the illustrious
guest, Madam of the White Shoulders and
myself. When she accepted my arm, she
at the Russian attache, who was also watch
ing closely. Upon Rays quiet demand for
surrender, which had Immediately followed,
this man had followed him to the carriage
without word. The other came as quietly.
They had then waited there some five min
utes when I appeared, with madam leaning
upon my arm. She had expressed great sur
prise at finding the two men there and under
arrest, and had demanded an explanation
from me. I had offered her the most abject
apologies, and had ordered Ray to at once
release his prisoners. had assured him
that the affair, from beginning to end, was
gigantic mistake, that the track we had
followed was entirely wrong one, that
we had offered untold insult to three inno-
cent people. He had no course but to credit
my word. I had then proceeded to assist
madam with great care to her carriage, and
she had driven rapidly away, the men fol-
lowing in another coupe. We fastened after
ward. Ray. the man who had come down
with US and myself, to the station, where I
had purchased with no further explanations
to my companions. three tickets to Boston.
which place we were now nearing. The
third man had made himself comfortable in
the smoking car, as there was no sleeper at
tached to the train, while Ray had sat all
night beside me. During this time I had
sat with wide-open eyes, staring straight be-
fore me, apparently lost in thought. and un-
til now he had not ventured to disturb me.
And SO the beginning of my first case
came to it's end.
Letters fortnight later from my friend.
upon the lives Of men In certain other
European cities had been made at the same
time. but, with the exception Of that in
which the French president fell, all had
been discovered and met in time.
l resigned my position at the Office, and
have since been devoting most of my time to
trying, upon my own responsibility, to get
trace Of Madam Of the White Shoulders. In
this quest, so far unsuccessful. for the last
two weeks l have enjoyed the assistance,
given with sympathetic zeal. of the girl who
saved my life from her, and who no longer
bears the name of Cutting
Should succeed in finding madam, hope
to force her to solve two problems; the first,
whether she and the young man who wore
a false beard and spoke with her voice were
identical-the one with the other. And If
so, whether she had exercised the same in
fluence which had so swayed my mind to
her will upon the jailer of the Portsmouth
prison, and by so doing had effected the es-
cape Of herself and her companions, upon
q previous occasion.
CThe end.)