Henry Seton Merriman

Purchase one of 1st World Library's Classic Books and help support our free internet library of downloadable eBooks. Visit us online at www.1stWorldLibrary. ORG - - Dearest Anna, - I see from the newspaper before me of March 13, that I am reported dead. Before attempting to investigate the origin of this mistake, I hasten to write to you, knowing, dearest, what a shock this must have been to you. It is true that I was in the Makar Akool affair, and was slightly wounded - a mere scratch in the arm - but nothing more. I have not written to you for some months past because I have been turning something over in my mind. Anna, dearest, there is no chance of my being in a position to marry for some years yet, and I feel it incumbent upon me ...

"Will you please ask Catrina to send me money through the usual channel? No more than she has been sending. It will suffice for my small wants. Perhaps some day we may meet in Switzerland or in America. Tell the dear child that. Tell her I pray the good God to allow that meeting. As for Russia, her day has not come yet. It will not come in our time, my dear friend. We are only the sowers. So much for the future. Now about the past. I have not been idle. I know who stole the papers of the Charity League and sold them. I know who bought them and paid for them." Steinmetz closed the door. He came back to the table. He was not smiling now -- quite the contrary. "Tell me," he said. "I want to know that badly." The Count Lanovitch looked up with a peculiar soft smile -- acquired in prison. There is no mistaking it. "Oh, I bear no ill will," he said. "I do," answered Steinmetz bluntly. "Who stole the papers from Thors?"