In the Fog

ced on its rolls distinguishes the new member as greatly as though he

f them which clubs he frequents, he will name all save that particular one. He is

olden Grill which Charles the Second presented to the Club, and the original manuscript of "Tom and Jerry in London," which

ime Minister of each party. At the same sitting at which one of these fell, it elected, o

Prince of Wales, was made an honorary member-only foreigners may be honorary members-he said, as he

pliment, because the only men who can read their nam

ond panes, which looks down upon the street. The four men at the table were strangers to each other, but as they picked at the grilled bones, and sipped their Scotch and soda, they conversed with such charming animation that a visitor to the Club, which does not tolerate visitors, would have counted them as friends of long acquaintance, certainly not as English

ether, with the candles grouped about them, and the long len

s, or who investigates deadly poisons, passes through adventures daily. No, 'adventures are for the adventurous.' But one no longer ventures. The spirit of it has died of inertia. We are grown too practical, too just, above all, too sensible. In this room, for instance, members of this Club have, at the sword's point, disputed the proper scanning of one of Pope's couplets. Over so weighty a matter as spilled Burgundy on a gentleman's cuff, ten men fought across this table, each with his rapier in one hand and a candle in the other. All ten were

kindly, wrinkled countenance, which wore continually a smile of almost childish confidence and good-nature. It was a face which the illustrated p

e watch would not interfere, the passers-by would take to their heels, my hired bullies and ruffians would convey him to some lonely spot where we would guard him until morning. Nothing would co

the members. "And why Sir Andrew, of all person

the black pearl shr

wing that if he does"-the gentleman laughed ruefully-"if he does, it will go through. Now, had I the spirit of our ancestors," he exclaimed, "I would bring chloroform from the nearest chemist's and drug him in

eshened interest. The honorary member of the Grill, whose ac

e would not guess he was deeply co

s nodded

nce we first entered," added the youngest mem

ing these last hours of the session the House sits late, but when the Navy bi

of a somewhat sporting appearance, in a short

d rattle off a speech in Parliament. I 'd be in a devil of a funk myself. And yet he is

t his eyes even now when he cuts the pages. It is probably an Admiralty Rep

h the black pearl

eply engrossed," he said, "is called 'The Great Rand Robb

ised his eyebro

?" he repeated incredulou

them even into the sacred precincts of the House, and from the Government benches reads them concealed inside his hat. Once started on a tale of murder, robbery, and sudden death, nothing can tear him from it, not even the call of the division bell, nor of hunger, nor the prayers of the party Whip. He gave up his country house because when he journeyed to it in the train he would become so absorbed in his detectiv

on that with his forefinger he was now separating the last two pages of th

ace in his hands at this moment a new story of Sherlock Holme

ore to him some special application, and then at an idea which a

the open fire. For a brief space no one moved until the baronet withdrew his eyes and, with a sudden sta

instantly broke the silenc

ied, "could not decipher the mystery whi

he gentlemen about the table started as suddenly as though the American had fired a pist

he black pearl was t

g himself across the table. "A myste

f it. Tell us at once,

omfortably, and picked u

m the only witness, I am, in spite of my immunity as a diplomat, detained in London by the authorities of Scotland Yard. My name," he said, inclining his head politely, "is Sears, Lieuten

so pronounced an exclamation of excitement and del

olice because he is the only witness of a most remarkable crime-the most remarkable crime, I believe you sa

two other members. They were looking doubtfully at him, a

in the light of the candles

terfering with a representative of a friendly power. If I were not forced to

shed the chair toward Sir Andre

aimed. "Mr. Sears is just about to

eaned forward across the table. The others drew their chairs nearer and bent toward him. The baronet glanced irresolutely at his watch, and w

nd as to begin, sir,"

nces of this Club are inviolate. Until the police give the facts to the public press, I must consider you my c

eated around hi

onet assented with e

ntleman with the black pearl, "as

living in a small house in Rutland Gardens opposite the Knightsbridge barracks. I telegraphed him that I was in London, and yesterday morning I received a most hearty invitation to dine with him the same evening at his house. He is a bachelor, so we dined alone and talked over all our old days

g, we could hear the cab whistle sounding violentl

e on strike,' my friend said, as

e curtains and at

own that the house looked out upon the street I would have believed that I was facing a dead wall. I raised the sash and stretched out my head, but still I could see nothing. Even the light of the street l

nd find the way to my hotel on foot. He objected, but the letters I had to write were for the Navy Department, and, besides, I ha

a row of houses set back from the sidewalk. They would bring me to a cross street. On the other side of this street was a row of shops which I was to follow until they joined the iron railings of Hyde Park. I was to keep to the railings

you.' The light from his open door disappeared with a bang, and I was left alone in a dripping, yellow darkness. I have been in the Navy for ten years, but I have never known such a fog as that of last night, not even among the icebergs of Behring Sea. There one at least could see the light of the binnacle, but last night I could not even distinguish the hand by which I guided myself along the barrack wall. At sea a fog is a natural phenome

sant conviction that at any moment I might step over a precipice. Since I had set out I had heard no traffic in the street, and now, although I listened some minutes, I could only distinguish the occasional footfalls of pedestrians. Several times I called aloud, and once a jocular gentleman answered me, but only to ask me where I thought he was, and then even he was swallowed up in t

me, and the scrape of a foot moving cautiously, or a muffled c

Desert. There seemed to be no reason in waiting longer for an escort, so I again set out, and at once bumped against a low iron fence. At first I believed this to be an area railing, but on following it I found that it stretched for a long distance, and that it was pierced at regular intervals with gates. I was standing uncertainly with my hand on one of these when a square of light suddenly opened in the night, and in it I saw, as you see a picture thrown by a biograph in a darkened theatre, a young gentleman in evening dress, and back of him the lights of a hall. I guessed from its elevation and distance from the side-walk that this light must come from the door

went up the path, and, after much fumbling, found the knob of the door-bell and gave it a sharp pull. The bell answered me from a great depth and distance, but no movement followed from inside the house, and although I pulled the bell again and again I could hear nothing save the dripp

pen, and as I stepped opposite to it I saw that it was a sort of reception or waiting-room, and that it was empty. The door below it was also open, and with the idea that I would surely find some one there, I walked on up the hall. I was in evening dress, and I felt I did not look like a burglar, so I had no great fear that, should I encounter one o

. The silence of the place began to try my nerves, and in a sudden, unexplainable panic I started for the open street. But as I turned

because I could see no one, but at sigh

lted at the waist and hung outside black velvet trousers which, in turn, were stuffed into high black boots. I recognized the costume at once as

d began bowing rapidly and making deprecatory gestures. I had picked up enough Russian in Petersburg to make out that t

d, 'Will the Excellency come t

ought it would be easy enough to explain my intrusion to a man, but how a woman would l

en he rapped twice on the door of what was apparently the drawing-room. There was no reply to his knock, and he tapped again, and then timid

ining-room. The solitary candle which still burned there seemed to assure him that the room also was empty. He came back

g-room. I decided that the adventure had gone quite far enough, and if I had been able to explain to the Russian that I

not then foresee that I would disturb a Russian princess in her boudoir, or that I might be thrown out by her athletic bodyguard. Still, I thought I ought not now to leave the

Near the front windows was a grand piano, and at the other end of the room a heavily carved screen of some black wood, picked out with ivory. The screen was overhung with a canopy of silken draperies, and formed a sort of alcove. In front of the alcove was spread the white skin of a polar bear, and set

been sitting there since I had come into the room, even since I had entered the house, and he had heard the servant knocking upon the door. Why he had not declared himself I could not understand, but I supposed that possibly he was a guest, with no reason to interest himself in the Princess's other visitors, or

or my intrusion and to leave the house, I walked up to the alcove and peered around it. Inside the screen was a divan piled with cus

against a cushion. His attitude was one of complete ease. But his mouth had fallen open, and his e

that he had not died through any ordinary failure of the laws of nature. The expression on his face was much too terrible to be misin

oor for the weapon, and, at the same moment, out of concern for my own sa

, and as I withdrew them I found them wet with blood. He was in evening dress, and in the wide bosom of his shirt I found a narrow slit, so narrow that in the dim light it was scarcely discernable. The wound was no wider than the smallest blade of a pocket-knife, but when I stripped the shirt away from the chest and left it bare, I found that the weapon, narrow as it was, had been long enough to reach his heart. There is no need to tell you how I felt as I stood by the body of this boy, for he was hardly olde

, that he had had no hand in his own death. I judged it, therefore, of the first importance to discover who was in the house, or, if they had escaped from it, who had been in the house before I entered it

to find, in the same room with the murdered man. I judged that she must now be either upstairs with the servant, or that she had, without his knowledge, already fled from the house. When I recalled his apparently genuine surprise at not finding her in the drawing-room,

tiful woman, lying at full length upon the floor, her arms flung out on either side of her, and her white face and shoulders gleaming dully in the unsteady light of the candle. Around her throat was a great chain of diamonds, and the light played upon these and made them flash and blaze in tiny flames. But the woman who wore them was dead, and I was so certain as to how she had died that without an instant's hesitation I dropped on my knees beside

gether. It was my intention to again search for this strange dagger which had been used to kill both the English boy and the beautiful pri

re but that this man himself was the murderer. His own face was plainly visible to me in the light from the hall, and I c

said. 'The Princess has

I demanded. 'Who e

Englishmen

en?' I demanded. 'W

upon his answer, and he began to protest that he did not know the na

frightened him, so I took my hand o

been here?' I asked,

ind him toward

turned here to the table. She sat there in that chair, and I brought her cognac and cigarettes. Then I sat outside upon the bench. It was a feast day, and I had been

he truth. His fright had passed, and he w

n,' I urged. 'Try to think. When you announced

In the corner furthest from the screen was the piano, and on it was a silver tray. He picked this up and, smiling with pr

t the faces about him. "I read the names,"

ried the Baro

ere the names of two brothers. One is well known to you. It is that of the African explorer of whom this gentl

ack as though a trapdoor ha

glanced at each other and back to the American

ear sir, young Chetney only arrived from Africa y

in a resolute square, and

Chetney did arrive in London yesterday mornin

He seemed much less concerned over the identity of the

d then? You say you found two visiting cards. How d

the chorus of exclamations had ceased. Then he

case, and I found on all the cards it contained the title of the Earl of Chetney. His watch and cigarette-case also bore his name. These evidences, and the fact of his bronzed skin,

t, and I was still on my knees when I heard a cry behind me. I

ed the steps in a jump and ran down the garden walk but just as the gate clicked in front of me. I had it open on the instant, and, following the sound of the man's footsteps, I raced after him across the open street. He, also, could hear me, and he instantly stopped running, and there

uted out, as though it were something human which I could compel to obey me, and then I caught my foot against the curb and smashed into the sidewalk. When I rose to my feet I was dizzy and half stunned, and though I thought then that I was moving toward the door, I know now that I probably turned directly from it; for, as I groped about in the night, calling frantically for the police,

. What I have to tell you now is

rracks, that within fifty yards of it some one was giving a dance to the music of a Hungarian band, and that the railings before it were as high as a man's waist and filed to a point. With that to work upon, twenty men were at onc

me, and from him I learned the police th

Arthur. He did not return to his father's house last night, and there is no trace of him; but from what the police knew of the past live

years ago the Princess Zichy, as she calls herself, and he were constantly together, and Chetney informed his friends that they were about to b

Russian Third Section, but that lately she had been repudiated by her own government and was living by her wits, by blackmail, and by her beauty. Lord Edam laid this record before his son, but Chetney either kn

m Chetney, but he swore if his son saw the woman again that the

us sums from the money lenders. This is of great importance, as the police believe it was these debts which drove him to the murder of his brother. Yesterday, as you know, Lord Chetney suddenly returned from the grave, and it was the fact that for two years he had been considered as dead which lent such importance to his return and which gave rise to those columns of detail concerning him which appeared in all the afternoon papers. But, obviously, during his absence he had not tired of t

e him, young Arthur made himself the heir beyond further question. The death of his brother would have availed nothing if the woman remained alive. It is then possible that he crossed the hall, and with the same weapon which made him Lord Edam's heir destroyed the solitary witness to the murder. The only other person who could have seen it was sleeping in a drunken stupor, to which fact undoubtedly he owed his life. And yet," concluded the Naval Attache, leaning forward and marking each word with his finger, "Lord

earl took no part. Instead, he arose, and, beckoning a servant to a far corner of the room, whispered earn

d. "Be seated, Sir Andrew," he begged. "Let us have the opinion of an exp

ose reluctantly

most important that I proceed to the House. I should have been there some

the Naval Attache. "There are surely many details that y

t interrup

"for I could not possi

Lord Arthur is arrested or the bodies are found there is n

gh stories about her to fill a book. She was a most remarkable woman." The speaker dropped the end of his cigar into his coffee cup and, taking his case from his pocket,

et her," he said, "she

regarded h

o rob you?"

in the black tie, "and of the Czarina's diamonds.

spiciously at the speaker, and then at the others about the table. But the

a necklace of diamonds. I was told to take them to the Russian Ambassador in

u say that this same Princess Zichy, one of the victims of thi

bably. "It's not much of a story, but it gives you an idea of the wom

" he cried, shaking his head in protest. "Do not tempt me. I

chorus of polite murmurs, and the Queen's Messenger, bowing his head in acknowledgment, took a preparatory sip from his glass. At the same moment the s

bowed to t

waiting, Sir A

en's Messenger. "It was a present from the Queen of England to

rtainly mean to hear this." He turned irritably to the servant. "Tell the hansom to wait," he

ack pearl smiled blandly,

r for the story of the Queen's Mes