“I give you my word, sir, that never for one instant did the idea occur to me that people might think that I had been murdered, nor did I imagine that anyone might be caused serious danger through this stratagem by which I endeavoured to gain a fresh start in the world.  On the contrary, it was the thought of relieving others from the burden of my presence which was always uppermost in my mind.  A sailing vessel was leaving Liverpool that very day for Corunna, and in this I took my passage, thinking that the voyage would give me time to recover my balance, and to consider the future.  But before I left my resolution softened.  I bethought me that there was one person in the world to whom I would not cause an hour of sadness.  She would mourn me in her heart, however harsh and unsympathetic her relatives might be.  She understood and appreciated the motives upon which I had acted, and if the rest of her family condemned me, she, at least, would not forget.  And so I sent her a note under the seal of secrecy to save her from a baseless grief.  If under the pressure of events she broke that seal, she has my entire sympathy and forgiveness.

“It was only last night that I returned to England, and during all this time I have heard nothing of the sensation which my supposed death had caused, nor of the accusation that Mr. Arthur Morton had been concerned in it.  It was in a late evening paper that I read an account of the proceedings of yesterday, and I have come this morning as fast as an express train could bring me to testify to the truth.”

Such was the remarkable statement of Dr. Aloysius Lana which brought the trial to a sudden termination.  A subsequent investigation corroborated it to the extent of finding out the vessel in which his brother Ernest Lana had come over from South America.  The ship’s doctor was able to testify that he had complained of a weak heart during the voyage, and that his symptoms were consistent with such a death as was described.

As to Dr. Aloysius Lana, he returned to the village from which he had made so dramatic a disappearance, and a complete reconciliation was effected between him and the young squire, the latter having acknowledged that he had entirely misunderstood the other’s motives in withdrawing from his engagement.  That another reconciliation followed may be judged from a notice extracted from a prominent column in the Morning Post: 

“A marriage was solemnized upon September 19th, by the Rev. Stephen Johnson, at the parish church of Bishop’s Crossing, between Aloysius Xavier Lana, son of Don Alfredo Lana, formerly Foreign Minister of the Argentine Republic, and Frances Morton, only daughter of the late James Morton, J.P., of Leigh Hall, Bishop’s Crossing, Lancashire.”

The Jew’s Breastplate