The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1898-05-09

troduced into the finger of the grows oAe
tiny piece of glass he, during thau evon-
ing at the Nook. took out his victim s
gloves from his overcoat in the hall l., ana
replaced them by those prepared. Mnen
Dudley left to walk home he PAGE lars
we'll to you. and at once put on MS g1ovses
received a scratch on the finger SO silgn1
as to lie almost unnoticeable, yet within
five minutes the effects of the poison hau
reached his heart, and he was peyohu
human add
Amazing" cried, regarding my
whllom friend with intense loathing as
he stood before us his face a CHASTITY nue..
Its untrue! Who will believe such
woman?" he cried.
quickly. "See, here is the proof," and
she drew from her pocket Well-worn
suede glove of dark grey, which | recog,,
niZed at once as being one of the kluo
always worn by Dudley. "The splinter OF
glass is still inside.'
The man who had led the double life of
spy and legislator. and who had amassed
great fortune in his speculations in
African gold. stood livid with terror
stricken eyes rivetted upon the evidence
OF his crime like one transfxed.
The Gar will have no further employ
ment for murderer" exclaimed Ella at
last. Neither will the House of Com
mons permit a spy to sit in it's mid ST.
When l consented to enter the Secret Ser
vice OF His Majesty it was with one object
to obtain permission to marry. This l
have attained, and because of Godfrey S
generosity and free forgiveness 1 have
now no further fear of the opinion of the
world or of revelations by q man who is
proved to be murderer. At last I have
secured freedom from your hateful tie. !"
:" Then you intend to denounce mef'
Beck cried. glancing round with a wild,
hunted look.
'Twenty-four hours from now I shall
place Lord Warnham in possession of the
whole of these facts. If you are still upon
English soil you will be arrested for the
murder OF my friend" answered,
calmly. II see plainly how. while left
you alone with the dead man, you placed
him, and how oleverly you managed to
introduce the bogus passport and evidence
of forgery among his possessions. Yours
was deyilish ingenuity, indeed"
''If I fly you will not follow he
gasped eagerly.
wherever you may hide you will be
followed by your guilt" answered. ga
murderer can hope for no forgivneSs from
his fe How men"
With his chin sunk upon his breast and
his wild eyes downcast he stood in silence
leaning heavily against the wall. Then.
slowly, with final look upon him,
passed out behind my wife and the pale
faced woman who had SO clearly substan-
tiated her terrible charge. The vengeance
he had sought to bring upon Ella had
fallen upon him, and completely crushed
him.
In the library at Berkeley Square on
the following afternoon I explained the
whole of the startling facts to the
wizened, ascetic old Earl, who sat speech
less in amazement when he realized that
Andrew Beck was actually q foreign spy
1t was during the conversation that fol-
lowed learnt that the man SO dearly
loved by Sonia was Cscill Bingham, the
young country gentleman who, known to
both, had sought to assist Ella i'll unearth-
ing the identity Of Dudley's murderer.
Sonia had missjudged my wife entirely,
for she had never denounced her to Cecil,
and the latter, being at that moment a
guest in tho Earl's house, was sent for,
and before US all the pair became recon
ciled.
Elizaveta Nicolayevna, or Ella, as I still
call her, has now renowned her country,
ago Lord Warnham, assured of my wife's
probity, for greatly to M. Grodekoff g
dismay, she had given some valuable in
formation regarding the activity of the
Russian Secret Service at Downing street,
appointed me to responsible post at our
Embassy in Paris, so that we now live
together at the big white house in the
Avenue des Champs Elysees, while Sonia
and Cecil are also married and live quiet
ly in quaint old manor-house near Win.
chester. 1t was only the other day, how.
ever, that we heard mention of Andrew
Beck, the popular legislator who had so
mysteriously accepted stewardship of the
Chiltern Hundreds. There was para
graph in the newspapers stating that he
had been found drowned in the Scheldt,
near Antwerp, and foul play was suspect
ed. Then Ella explained to me that the
woman who had passed as her mother,
Mrs. Laing. was, she afterwards discoy-
cred, well known Nihilist, and it was
in order to keep observation9 upon her
that the detective Renouf had entered her
service. This woman, whose real name
was Sophie Grunsberg, was greatly in
censed against Beck on account of certain
false accusations he had made against
members of the revolutionary organiza-
ton, and there was little doubt that he
had fallen beneath their far-reach1ng VEN
geance.
Here, as / pen these last few lines of
my strange story of England's peril, my
own betrayal, and my wife's fond love,
Ella, with sweet, glad smile, moves for
ward to stroke my hair with soft, caress-
ing hand. The odour of sampaguita per-
yades her chitfons and stirs within me
memories Of che past. We are together in
the room know SO weli with it's great
windows overlooking the leafy Avenue.
1t Is warm, the jallousies are closed, and
from somewhere outside the gay air Isl
qu'on leuri-z-y f'rait ca'' is borne in upon
the summer wind.
At last our days are full of passionate
love and idyllic happiness. Verify there
Is great truth in those words of Holy
Writ, Whose fndeth wife, fndeth a
good thing
(The End.)