While Woodroffe was in the hotel I dared not show myself lest he should recognize me, therefore I was compelled to sham indisposition and to eat my meals alone in my room.
Both the means by which she had met Martin Woodroffe and the motive were equally an enigma.

By that letter she had written to her schoolfellow it was apparent that she had some secret of his, for had she not wished to send him a message of reassurance that she had divulged nothing?
This would seem that they were close friends; yet, on the other hand, something seemed to tell me that he was acting falsely, and was really an ally of the Baron's.
Why had he brought her to Petersburg?
If he had desired to rescue her he would have taken her in the opposite direction--to Stockholm, where she would be free--whereas he took her, an escaped prisoner, into the very midst of peril.

It was true that her passport was in order, yet I remembered that an order had been issued for her transportation to Saghalien, and now once arrested she must be lost to me for ever.

This thought filled me with fierce anxiety.

She was in Petersburg, that city where police spies swarm, and where every fresh arrival is noted and his antecedents inquired into.