On my return to London next day I made inquiry at the Admiralty and
learned that the battleship Bulwark was lying at Palermo, therefore I
telegraphed to Jack Durnford, and late the same afternoon his reply came
at the Cecil:--
"Due in London twentieth. Dine with me at club that evening--Jack."
The twentieth! That meant nearly a month of inactivity. In that time I
could cross to Abo, make inquiries there, and ascertain, perhaps, if
Elma Heath were actually dead as Chater had declared.
Two facts struck me as remarkable: Baron Oberg was said to be Polish, while the dark-bearded proprietor of the restaurant in Westbourne Grove was also of the same nationality. Then I recollected that pretty little enameled cross that Mackenzie had found in Rannoch Wood, and it suddenly occurred to me that it might possibly be the miniature of one of the European orders of chivalry. In the club library at midnight I found a copy of Cappelletti's Storia degli Ordini Cavallereschi, the standard work on the subject, and on searching the illustrations I at length discovered a picture of it. It was a Russian order--the coveted Order of Saint Anne, bestowed by the Czar only upon persons who have rendered eminent services to the State and to the sovereign. One fact was now certain, namely, that the owner of that tiny cross, the small replica of the fine decoration, must be a person of high official standing.
Next day I spent in making inquiries with a view to discovering the
house said to be occupied by Leithcourt. As it was not either in the
Directory or the Blue Book, I concluded that he had perhaps rented it
furnished, and after many inquiries and considerable difficulties I
found that such was the fact. He had occupied the house of Lady
Heathcote, a few doors from Grosvenor Square, for the previous season, although he had lived there but very little.
Where the fugitives were in hiding I had no idea. I longed to meet
Muriel again and tell her what I had discovered, yet it was plain that
the trio were concealing themselves from Hylton Chater, whom I supposed
to be now back in London.
The autumn days were dull and rainy, and the streets were muddy and
unpleasant, as they always are at the fall of the year. Compelled to
remain inactive, I idled in the club with the recollection of that
pictured face ever before me--the face of the unfortunate girl who
wished her last message to be conveyed to Philip Hornby. What, I
wondered, was her secret? What was really her fate?
This latter question troubled me until I could bear it no longer. I felt
that it was my duty to go to Finland and endeavor to learn something
regarding this Baron Oberg and his niece. Frank Hutcheson had written me
declaring that the weather in Leghorn was now perfect, and expressing
wonder that I did not return. I was his only English friend, and I knew
how dull he was when alone. Even his Majesty's Consuls sometimes suffer
from homesickness, and long for the smell of the London gutters and a
glass of homely bitter ale.
But you, my reader, who have lived in a foreign land for any length of
time, know well how wearisome becomes the life, however brilliant, and
how sweet are the recollections of our dear gray old England with her
green fields, her muddy lanes, and the bustling streets of her gray, grimy cities. You have but one "home," and England Is still your home, even though you may become the most bigoted of cosmopolitans and may have no opportunity of speaking your native tongue the whole year through.
Duty--the duty of a man who had learned strange facts and knew that a
defenseless woman was a victim--called me to Finland. Therefore, with my
passport properly viséd and my papers all in order, I one night left
Hull for Stockholm by the weekly Wilson service. Four days of rough
weather in the North Sea and the Baltic brought me to the Swedish
capital, whence on the following day I took the small steamer which
plies three times a week around the Aland Islands, and then across the
Gulf of Bothnia to Korpo, and through the intricate channels and among
those low-lying islands to the gray lethargic town of Abo.