You, my reader, are probably curious to know whether I have succeeded in obtaining the quiet country practice that was my ideal. Well, yes, I have. And what is more, I have obtained in Ethelwynn a wife who is devoted to me and beloved by all the countryside--a wife who is the very perfection of all that is n.o.ble and good in woman. The Courtenay estate is ours; but I am not an idle man. Somehow I cannot be.
My practice? Where is it? Well, it is in Leicestershire. I dare not be more explicit, for Ethelwynn has urged me to conceal our ident.i.ty, in order that we may not be remarked as a couple whose wooing was so strangely tragic and romantic.
Ambler Jevons still carries on his tea-blending business in the City, the most confirmed of bachelors, and the shrewdest of all criminal investigators. Even though we have been so intimate for years, and he often visits me at ---- I was nearly, by a slip, writing the name of the Leicestershire village--he has never explained to me his methods, and seldom, if ever, speaks of those wonderful successes by which Scotland Yard is so frequently glad to profit.
Only a few days ago, while we were sitting on the lawn behind my quaint old-fashioned house awaiting dinner, I chanced to remark upon the happiness which his ingenuity and perseverance had brought me; whereupon, turning to me with a slight, reflective smile, he replied:
"Ah, yes! Ralph, old fellow. I gave up that problem in despair fully a dozen times, and it was only because I knew that the future happiness of you both depended upon its satisfactory solution that I began afresh and strove on, determined not to be beaten. I watched carefully, not only Eyton, but Ethelwynn and yourself. I was often near you when you least suspected my presence. But that crafty old scoundrel was possessed of the ingenuity of Satan himself, combined with all the shrewd qualities that go to make a good detective; hence in every movement, every wile, and every action he was careful to cover himself, so that he could establish an _alibi_ on every point.
For that reason the work was extremely difficult. He was a veritable artist in crime. Yes," he added, "of the many inquiries I"ve taken up, the most curious and most complicated of them all was that of The Seven Secrets."
THE END.