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ready, and with nothing but a sandwich and a glass of Burton since breakfast, I am ready for the dinner."

Henry said he did not wish to keep Mr. Stot from his dinner, but he was very anxious to hear the news, and if Mr. Stot could give him a minute he should be obliged.

"It can't be told in

but the dinner won't.

a minute, Mr. Clayton. The news will keep, Never cheat the appetite. The man who will not stop to feed his horse, or the engine-driver who is in such a hurry that he will not stop to take in water, will never get to the end of his journey. We will soon make empty dishes, and then I am yours to command.”

The trio went to the dining-room. The promised bone to pick consisted of soup, fish, beef, and wine worthy of the viands. Henry was not a lively companion, but Stot told professional stories, and laughed at his own jokes. Henry wondered if Stot was as liberal and civil to all his clients.

"I am sorry, Mr. Clayton, that you are such a poor knife and forker, but don't cut the bottle. The glass of sherry before you may be matched, but can't be beat. You might swim in it for a month without the shade of a headache."

Henry did not refuse the sherry, but it might as well have been poured upon gravel. Drink does not quench the burning thirst of fever, and wine does not stimulate the over anxious mind.

When the cheese had been tasted, and the celery crunched, Mr. Stot told the partner of his joys that he should like his port in the study.

"Excuse me for a second, Mr. Clayton, whilst I get up and decant the wine. Port at one hundred and ten, and that cannot be dittoed at one hundred and anything, is no joke."

Stot disappeared, and cheered by the prospect of an immediate communication, Henry was more lively. When Mrs. Stot expressed regret that her guest had not eaten enough to keep the body and soul of an infant together, he replied that he had enjoyed his dinner. That was not true, for from soup to scented water-the Clephane Villa finger glasses are splendid-Henry had inly anathematised the dinner. We must not condemn Henry Clayton for his conventional fibbing. When a young lady does cruel violence to a song, what can you say if the fond mamma asks your opinion? Can you say "Your daughter's voice is execrable, and though she is a favourite pupil of Signor Doremi, and you pay half a guinea a lesson, she knows no more of music than a stuffed owl"? Ought Henry to have said to Mrs. Stot "Your dinner has been a bore to me, from

soup to scented water"? Sometimes, in morals as in law, the criminality depends upon the intent.

Stot, who was a long time decanting, returned and conducted his guest to the study. It was a fine room, hung with handsome curtains; there was a handsome bookcase chock full of handsomely bound books, and easy chairs, and a couch that was grateful to the eye of the weary. On a table before the fire were port, claret, brandy, and cigars.

"The port before smoke, Mr. Clayton, though they are fine cigars and cost me a pound apiece. I am not joking. I am in the lending way, for you can't live tip top out of detecting, and all I got for over three hundred pounds hard cash was about three hundred of these cigars. But they are good."

"Thanks for your kindness, Mr. Stot. But tell me have you tracked him?"

"Tracked he is, but he is out of your reach."

Henry jumped up, and struck, the table with his fist. The table was a strong one, or Mr. Stot's exquisite glass would have been smashed.

"He is not out of my reach. That is impossible. I have sworn to pursue him to the ends of the earth. I will see Mellish face to face

--and you know the rest."

"You want to be quits with him ?"

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'Quits with Mellish? How can I be quits with the wretch who has robbed me of name, of home, of wife, and of my child? I can only take the dog by the throat, and hold him till he is dead. And that I will do, so help me God!"

"I don't think you will, Mr. Clayton."

"You have tracked him. Where is he?"

"Where is Mellish? What the fishes have left of him is at the bottom of the sea."

"Drowned! dead!" exclaimed Henry. "You would put me off the scent; but neither man nor devil shall rob me of my revenge."

"Anyhow, it won't hurt you to hear me out," said Stot, lighting a cigar. "Try a weed, Mr. Clayton. Nothing like a smoke when you are excited."

"Well, Mr. Stot, let me hear what you have heard."

"This is what I have heard. After your affair Mellish took to drinking, gambling, and galling: any one of them is black ruin, and the three together make black ruin quick as well as sure. He got into a bother and bolted. A friend of mine was set to find him for a

party who particularly wanted him. My friend tracked Mellish, calling himself Jones, Walter Jones. My friend tracked him to Liverpool. Mellish was off in a sailing vessel for America. My friend puts himself on a steamer, and was at the American port waiting for his bird. Vessel comes in, and my friend boards her. 'Where is Walter Jones?' says my friend. The captain tells him that Jones was washed overboard in a gale and was drowned. The log and the crew confirm the statement."

"That a Walter Jones was drowned. But how do we know that the drowned Walter Jones was Mellish ?"

"That, Mr. Clayton, is how I put it to my friend. Then he hands me evidence that looks like conclusive, and you will be the best judge of it. By permit of the British Consul my friend inspects the baggage of Jones. It was not worth much, but there were two letters in it. One my friend gave to the party who put him on the job, and the other he hands over to me. Here is the document taken from the baggage of the drowned Jones. Is it your writing, Mr. Clayton?" Henry seized the letter from Stot, scanned it quickly, flung it on the ground, stamped on it, and uttered a cry of rage.

"Cheated of my revenge! That is one of my letters to Mellish -the last I wrote to him. There is nothing left for me now, not

even revenge."

"The fellow is dead without your having the trouble and risk of killing him. That is not such very bad luck."

Stot knocked the ash off his cigar and mixed a tumbler of brandy and water. Henry was silent for two or three minutes, looking at the letter he had flung upon the ground.

"So, Mr. Stot, you think Mellish is dead?"

"We have not his dead body before us, Mr. Clayton, but the proof is not weak. Mellish is tracked to Jones. Jones was tracked aboard a ship. Ship comes in port, and there was no Jones. According to captain, crew, and log. Jones was drowned on the voyage. Jones's baggage is overhauled and the document lying there is found. This is what I call a case of extra strong circumstantial.” "Mr. Stot, I do not believe that Mellish is dead. I swear he is not dead."

"As aforesaid, we have not the body before us, but it is a poor chance of being picked up in the Atlantic."

"But was he overboard? Could he not bribe the captain to say he was dead, and so stop the pursuit ?"

"What about the crew? He would have to square the crew, man and boy, as well as the captain."

"It is of no use to reason with me. I know he lives. I know that some day I shall meet him face to face. I know that some day this right hand will be at his throat, and whilst he squeals for mercy I shall tighten my grasp until the craven dog is dead, and the last words he hears will be, 'Die, you dog! die with curses on your head! die, you dog! die, and be damned !'"

While Henry spoke, Stot ceased to smoke. Even the stolidity of the eminent detective was not proof against such an outburst of inhuman rage. When Henry had talked of strangling his enemy he had clenched his fist so tightly that he dug his nails into his flesh, and when he opened his hand there was blood upon it.

"I will go now, Mr. Stot. I will see you in a day or two." "Won't you take a cigar?"

"I cannot smoke. I must go quickly and walk off this passion. It will soon be over, and then I will wait and watch for the hour of revenge."

Mr. Stot saw Henry depart. When he returned to the study he drew aside a curtain that concealed a door, which, when he tried to open, he found to be locked.

"Come out; I am alone," said Stot, rattling the handle.

The door was unfastened from the inside, and a man entered the study. The man's face was livid, the sweat was falling from him, and he spoke as if he were stricken with palsy. He glanced fearfully round the room and clutched Stot's arm.

"He is off, and we are alone."

Then the man crouched in an easy chair, but he could not keep a limb or a muscle still. Stot offered him some brandy and water. The man could not hold the tumbler without the help of Stot. As he drank his teeth chattered against the glass.

"Ah," said Stot, "no need to tell the tale. I see you have kept your ears open, and you have heard enough."

(To be continued.)

VOL. X., N.S. 1873.

3 с

TABLE TALK.

BY SYLVANUS URBAN, GENTLEMAN.

THE praises, unreserved and but little qualified, which have been lavished upon the memory of John Stuart Mill by the whole round of the political press are a testimony of the splendid toleration of the time in intellectual circles. Think for a moment of the prevailing doctrines and beliefs of the English people, political, social, and religious, and then run your eye over the biographical notices and articles which appeared in connection with the announcement of the death of the author of the "System of Logic," not in the Daily News and the Daily Telegraph only, but in the Times, the Pall Mall Gazette, the Standard, the Hour, and in the leading provincial morning journals. It was not the purpose of those notices to give an exposition of the opinions and conclusions arrived at by Mr. Mill on almost the whole range of speculative subjects; they took those for granted; they summarised his labours; and they were unanimous and more or less enthusiastic in acknowledging and insisting upon the great services of this man's life to the cause of progress and to the welfare of the human race. Those articles were intended for, and were no doubt read by, millions of English-speaking people, ninety-nine hundredths of whom are profoundly orthodox in their notions on some or all of the subjects dealt with by Mr. Mill, and the large majority of whom, though they no doubt read these obituary biographies with a certain glow of acquiescence, would have been shocked and alarmed if among the other remembrances of the great man's career had appeared a bald summary of his beliefs and his conclusions. John Stuart Mill was never ashamed of his opinions; let us remind ourselves of what some of them were, in order the better to understand how wide a licence a great man may take, in this country of well-regulated beliefs. Mr. Mill did not believe that the world, as we see it and know it, really exists. He did not believe in the freedom of the human will. He did not think that we possessed any knowledge of God, of supernatural things, of the destiny of man after death, or of the world to come. In political economy he doubted the expediency of recognising private property in land. He called in question the policy of unrestricted increase of population.

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