opening between the dingy old rep curtains fell across the threadbare carpet in a golden bar, he became quiet again.

“Ah, signore,” he said gratefully, “it is really extremely good of you to put yourself out on my account—a perfect stranger.”

“Nothing, nothing,” I assured him. “It is only what you would do for me if I were ill in a foreign country where I could not speak the language.”

“Ay, that I would,” he declared. And after a pause he added: “Nearness to death causes us to make strange friendships—doesn’t it?”

“Why?” I asked, somewhat puzzled.

“Well—in me, for instance, you are making a strange friend,” he said, with a queer, harsh laugh.

“Why strange?”

“Because you are utterly unaware of who or what I am.”

“I know your name—that is all,” I responded quietly. “You know the name by which I choose to be known here. It is not likely that I should disclose my real identity.”

“Why not?”

“Because—well, there are strong reasons,” was his vague answer, and his mouth shut with a snap, as though he discerned that he had already said too much. Then a moment later he added: “As I’ve already told you, you have made a strange acquaintance in me. You will probably be surprised if ever you really do ascertain the truth, which is, however, not very likely, I think. At least I hope not.”

I recollected that he had spoken of a secret—some woman’s secret—which he intended, at all hazards, to preserve. What was it, I wondered?

The thin drawn face upon the white pillow wore a wild, desperate expression. The stranger had actually laughed in triumph at the suggestion of death. A man must be desperate ere he can face the open grave with a smile upon his lips.

After a few minutes he raised his thin yellow finger beckoning me closer, and in a fainter voice said:—

“You are the only friend I have in this great capital, Signor Leaf,”—for at table I had told him my name and something about my wandering life on the Continent—“you will not allow them to bury me as a pauper? There is money—see, in that left-hand top drawer—over there. Will you get my purse?”

I rose, opened the drawer he indicated, and handed him a bulky red morocco wallet, one of those in which Italians carry their paper currency.

He opened it and I saw that it was crammed with hundred-franc and even thousand-franc notes. In the wallet there was probably over a thousand pounds.

“Will you take charge of it?” he asked, handing it back. “I shall never want it again. Pay all the expenses, and I would ask of you one favour. Upon the stone over my grave put no name—only the words: ‘In Memory of one who was Unfortunate’—that is all.”

“And the balance of the money—to whom shall I hand that?”

He thought a few moments, his eyes fixed upon the low, smoke-blackened ceiling.

“If there is no just claimant within one year take five thousand francs as a souvenir of me, and present the remainder to a hospital—whatever hospital in London you think the most deserving. You will also find the directions for obtaining certain securities deposited in Italy. Obtain them and deal with them as you deem advisable.”

“But have you no relations?” I inquired, foreseeing a great difficulty in carrying out these verbal instructions.

“Relations! Bah! what are relations?” he cried excitedly. “Only an infernal encumbrance. I suppose I have some somewhere—everybody has more or less.”

“And don’t you know where yours are?”

“No, nor do I wish to know,” he snapped. “I am alone—you understand—entirely alone. And, moreover, I trust that if you are my friend, as you seem to wish to be, you will so far respect my memory as not to believe all that will probably be said against me. To you only I admit that I am not what I have represented myself to be—that is all. I accept your kindness, but, alas! with considerable shame.”

I drew the Italian notes from the wallet, and counted them.

“There are twenty-eight thousand lire here,” I remarked, “one thousand one hundred and twenty pounds.”

“What does it concern me how much there is?” he asked, smiling. “Use it as I’ve directed. Indeed,” he added, after a pause, “you need not tell any one that you have it.”

“I shall tell my friend Sampson, or people may think that I’ve stolen it,” I said.

“Yes,” he remarked hoarsely, with a sigh, “people are always ready to think ill of one, are they not?”

And then, as the bar of sunlight crept slowly across the worn-out carpet, a deep silence again fell, broken only by the stranger’s fierce, vengeful mutterings which to me conveyed no distinct meaning.

“Madonna mia!” he cried aloud once, cringing in excruciating pain. “How I suffer! I wonder how long it must be before I give out. Dio! Is this the punishment of hell?”

Then he turned his eyes upon me—those wide-open, horrified eyes—in a look the remembrance of which is even to-day still before me, the recollection of which I shall carry with me to the grave.

There was something indescribable about that expression, uncanny, fascinating, inhuman. They were the eyes of a man who, though still alive, was obtaining his first glance into the awful mysteries of the eternity.

At half-past seven Tulloch returned and brought him a soothing draught, so that he slept, and I then left the sick-room to dress and breakfast.

With Mrs Gilbert, Sammy and I agreed that no word of the painful affair should be told to our fellow-guests, because illness in a boarding-house always causes the visitors to make excuses for departure. So we said nothing.

Sampson had some urgent business with his solicitor in the City that day, therefore I remained at home, acting as nurse to the unfortunate man whose end was now so near.

Three times during the day Tulloch returned, but all he did proved unavailing. The stranger could not possibly live, he said. It was a wonder that he had had strength to withstand the journey to England. It was the reaction that was proving fatal—internal haemorrhage.

Just before six o’clock, when I crept on tiptoe back to the mysterious man’s darkened room to see if he still slept, he called me eagerly in a low whisper, saying that he wished to speak to me in strict confidence.

I therefore seated myself at his bedside and bent down, so that the effort of speaking should be as little as possible.

“There is still one further favour I would beg of you, Signor Leaf. I wonder whether—whether you would grant it?” he asked very feebly, stretching out his thin hand until it rested upon my wrist.

“If it is within my power, I will,” I assured him.

“Then you see this!” he exclaimed, drawing from beneath his pillow a small flat packet in white paper about four inches square and secured by three large black oval seals evidently impressed by some old monastic seal of the middle ages.

“I want you,” he said, “to accept the responsibility of this. They are papers of considerable value to certain relatives in Italy. Will you take charge of it, and