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For the lad's probably gone under another name. It's just a wild-goose chase that he's starting upon, I'm afraid." "They have seen each other." "Mr. Heron didn't tell me that. And where was it they saw each other, Miss Murray?" "In Italy and here. Here at Strathleckie. Oh, Mr. Colquhoun, it was Brian Luttrell who came with us as the boys' tutor, and we did not know. He called himself Stretton."

I turned at a rustle behind me and looked straight into the muzzle of Macartney's revolver and into Macartney's eyes! The boy at the fire let out a yelp and dropped flat. Dudley and Baker, invisible somewhere, neither spoke nor stirred. And I stood like a fool, as near the death of Nicholas Dane Stretton as ever I wish to get.

On the fly-leaf, a name had been scrawled in pencil John Stretton. Mr. Heron glanced at it through his eye-glass, nodded pleasantly, and regarded his new friend with increased respect.

At last, standing disconsolately in the porch, he saw her passing through the hall with little Jack in her arms, and the other boys hanging on to her dress, quite in the old Gower-street fashion. "Elizabeth, won't you come out?" he said. "I can't, just now. I am going to give the children some lessons. I do that, first thing." "Always?" "Ever since Mr. Stretton left," she said.

De Gex was still at Stretton Street, apparently quite unconscious that his hireling Sanz was being kept under close surveillance. Another plot was in progress, without a doubt. Twice again had the elusive Spaniard, who was such a close friend of the notorious Despujol, visited Stretton Street.

It was plain that somebody some woman, evidently was pacing the floor of the room to which this window belonged, and that she was repeating poetry, either to herself or to some silent listener. As she came near the window, Stretton heard the words of an old ballad with which he was himself familiar

I watched the pair for several minutes, wondering whether in my brain, unbalanced as it had been, the scene was a mere chimera on my part and that, after all, the girl only slightly resembled the victim at Stretton Street. The latter I had not seen in life, and death always alters the features.

If you cannot bear your own name, you have no business to live in an honest man's house under false pretences; you may, therefore, either tell me your whole story, and let me judge whether it is a disgraceful one or not, or you may go the quicker the better. That's what I should say to Mr. Stretton; and the sooner it is said to him the more I shall be pleased."

"Let me tell you something else," he said, hastily, as if anxious to change the subject. "Let me ask you as you are the arbitress of my destiny, my employer, I may call you when you will let me go. Could the boys do without me at once, do you think? You would soon find another tutor." "Mr. Stretton! Why should you go? Do you mean to leave us?" exclaimed Elizabeth.

Stretton hesitated about coming here; I see why he was startled when he discovered that I was the very girl whom he must have heard of before he left England. Of course, I should never have objected to surrender the property to its rightful owner; but in this case I shall be not only willing but pleased to give it back." Her tone was proud and independent.