spencer ellersby, well-dressed, nonchalant and languid, entered the room with a smile on his face, which faded quickly when he found there was no one present to receive him.

"i thought you said miss penfold was here," he observed sharply, turning to the footman who was showing him in.

"so she was, sir," stammered the servant in some confusion, "and two gentlemen."

"gentlemen!" muttered ellersby to himself, taking a chair, "some of those empty-headed men about town, i suppose."

"i think miss penfold must have gone up to the drawing-room, sir," said the servant, turning towards the door. "will i take your name up, sir?"

"no," replied ellersby, with a yawn. "i want to see sir rupert just now, so i'll wait here till he comes in, and go upstairs afterwards."

"very good, sir," said the footman, and was just retiring when sir rupert, looking jaded and worried, entered the room, upon which ellersby rose to his feet, and the footman going out, closed the door behind him.

"ah, sir rupert," he said carelessly, "i am so glad to see you, as i thought i'd have to wait for some time. i must apologise for coming into this room, but your servant said miss penfold was here."

"have you seen her?" said sir rupert, moodily, taking his seat in front of the desk and swinging round the seat so as to face his visitor.

"no, he made a mistake. she is up in the drawing-room, so i am going to see her later on."

"meanwhile?" demanded the baronet.

"i am going to see you," finished ellersby, smoothly, resuming his seat.

balscombe raised his eyebrows.

"what about?"

"a very important subject--marriage."

"whose marriage?"

"my own."

"what have i to do with your marriage?"

"a great deal," replied ellersby calmly, "because i want to marry miss penfold."

"impossible," said balscombe pointedly, "quite impossible."

"how so?" asked the other coolly. "i have a good position, plenty of money, and my character is good."

"your moral character?" sneering.

"oh, that," with a laugh, "is no better nor worse than other young men, so i would like your answer. will you favour my suit?"

"no."

"why not?"

"because, in the first place, my ward is going to marry myles desmond."

"marry myles desmond!" replied ellersby, with a sneer. "a man lying in prison under a charge of murder."

"he will be proved innocent of that charge."

"by whom?"

"'that's my business," retorted balscombe, with a scowl ellersby laughed in a most irritating manner.

"so that is your first objection," he said lightly. "pray what is your second?"

for answer balscombe turned to his desk, and unlocking a drawer, took therefrom a bundle of old letters tied with a blue ribbon.

"this is my second objection," he said, holding them up. "perhaps you recognise these letters?"

spencer ellersby turned pale and half rose from his seat.

"where did you find them?"

"in the secret drawer of this desk," replied the baronet. "my wife, thinking i did not know the hiding-place, put them there for safety; but her father told me about the secret drawer when he gave me the desk, and one day i opened it idly, not expecting to find anything, when i found these."

ellersby laughed discordantly.

"and what are those wonderful letters?"

"you need not pretend ignorance," said the baronet coldly. "these are letters written by you to my wife at folkestone under her maiden name of amelia dicksfall, and which prove that you were her lover long before she met me."

"i acknowledge it," said ellersby insolently. "and what have you to say about it?"

"simply this," replied balscombe, rising, "that you may thank god that i do not kill you where you sit. but my wife proved to be such a worthless woman she is not fit to be defended, and knowing this, you have the daring to ask me for my ward's hand. do you think i would give her to you, a scoundrel, a profligate?--never!"

"i think you will," said ellersby coldly, "for the very good and sufficient reason that i can force you to."

"how so?"

"you know well enough," sneered the other. "if the police ask me who committed the jermyn street murder, i can tell them who did it--rupert balscombe."

"you scoundrel!--do you mean to say i killed my wife?"

"i can swear it--and i will, too, if you don't give me your ward!"

"it's a cursed lie!" cried the baronet, white with fury; "where are your proofs?"

"open that hiding place, and you'll find them."

sir rupert gave a stifled cry, and staggered back against the desk, while ellersby looked at him with a smile of triumph. the three listeners in the other room were standing close to the door, with greedy ears drinking in every word of this strange conversation.

the baronet with an effort recovered himself and, turning to the desk, touched the secret spring and took down the carving. there lay the locket, the chain, and the fatal arrow.

"there is the locket you wrenched off your wife's neck on that night," said ellersby, pitilessly, "and there is the poisoned arrow-head with which you committed the crime!"

balscombe took out the objects and looked at them vacantly.

"what devilry is this?" he said, fiercely. "this is the locket i know--the locket that contains your hair and your picture, curse you! but the arrow-head--i know nothing of that."

"bah!--who would believe you?" replied the other, mockingly; "it is in your secret drawer!"

"how did you know this hiding-place?" demanded balscombe.

"i never said i knew it."

"no--but you said your evidence was in there, so you must have seen these things before. i believe you put the arrow-head there yourself."

"did i, indeed?" said ellersby with a sneer. "where would i get the arrow-head?--don't blame me for a crime you committed yourself."

"i did not commit it!" shouted balscombe in a frenzy. "i acknowledge i knew of my wife's intended elopement, and came up from berkshire to prevent it. i was too late, and went to calliston's rooms to see him. i missed the door in the fog, and when i found it, the first thing i saw was my guilty wife leaving t efhe house. i followed her, and caught up to her--she shrieked, and i gave way to my just anger. i knew she had this locket, and thought it contained calliston's portrait, not yours, so wrenched it off her neck to make sure. she ran away across the street and i lost her in the fog. i swear i saw no more of her on that night till i read of her death."

"you knew it was your wife that was dead?"

"i was not certain. i heard the seamew had sailed with lady balscombe on board, and thought that the dead woman was some wretched street-walker with whom my wife had changed clothes--but i was not certain she was dead till i saw lena sarschine on board the seamew--then i knew my wife was the victim of the jermyn street tragedy, but i swear i did not kill her."

ellersby laughed scoffingly.

"of course it is to your interest to say that--but who will believe you with such strong evidence against you?"

"then i suppose you mean to denounce me?" said the baronet coldly.

"not if you agree to give me the hand of may penfold."

"i cannot force her inclinations."

"no--but you are her guardian and can influence her."

"if i refuse?"

"you do so at your own risk."

"and that risk?"

"means hanging to you!" said ellersby, brutally.

the two men stood looking fixedly at one another, and for a few moments there was a dead silence, while the three listeners waited with beating hearts for the end of the conversation which seemed to promise the solution of this extraordinary mystery.

balscombe remained for a time in deep thought, and then looked up with a look of determination in his eyes.

"i decline to accede to your demand," he said, firmly.

"then you must take the consequence."

"i am prepared to do so."

ellersby paused for a minute.

"will you tell me the reason for your decision?"

"first, because i am innocent of the crime you accuse me of and second, i believe you placed this poisoned arrow-head here in order to implicate me in the murder."

"i can speak openly to you," said ellersby, coolly, "because you are in my power. i did place the poisoned arrow-head there, in order to secure evidence against you!"

"then it was you killed my wife!" cried balscombe, stepping towards him with the arrow-head in his hand.

"i never said i did!" retorted ellersby, audaciously, "but i can tell you this--i met your wife on that night after you left her, and i asked her for those letters as they compromised both her and myself. she told me where they were and described the hiding-place to me. last time i was here i searched and discovered the secret, but the letters were not there."

"no. they were removed by me."

"so i see--but if i did not find the letters, i found something better--the locket with my portrait which you took from your wife's neck on that night, so as i wanted to marry miss penfold and wanted you to help me, i placed there the arrow-head so as to force you for your own safety to help me. i have succeeded, and you must do what i order, or swing for it."

"you devil!" cried balscombe, madly. "it was you who murdered my unhappy wife--do not deny it!--i can see it in your cowardly face--i will accuse you before the world, and hang you for your crime!"

"bah!--who will believe your word against mine? there is no evidence against me!"

"your own confession!"

"does not include a confession of murder--what i have said to you in private i will deny in public--you have no witnesses."

"you lie--here are three!"

the two men turned round with a cry, and there, on the threshold of the room stood may penfold with a look of triumph in her eyes--and behind, dowker and norwood. ellersby saw he was lost, and with a harsh shriek made a bound for the door of the library; but before he could reach it balscombe threw himself on him and bore him to the ground. the two men rolled on the floor fighting desperately, and then dowker joined in to assist in securing ellersby, when suddenly his struggles ceased and he became quite passive.

"it's all over," he said quietly, with a livid face, as balscombe arose to his feet. "i will escape you yet."

"you will not escape the gallows," cried balscombe, panting.

"yes, i will," sneered ellersby, with a ghastly smile; "and by your own act. you forgot you had the poisoned arrow-head in your hand, and you have wounded me--see."

he held up his right hand and there they saw a long red ragged wound where the weapon had torn him.

"in ten minutes i will be a dead man," he said quietly. "not all the science in the world can save me now."

"curse it!" cried dowker in a rage, while the other three remained silent with horror.

"ah! you are angry at my escaping from you," said ellersby, with his usual cynicism. "console yourself, my astute thief-catcher, my capture would not have redounded to your credit as you were quite on the wrong scent. you suspected desmand, calliston, lena sarschine and balscombe; everyone but the right one. i have fooled you to the end, and, now i am caught, will yet escape your clutches."

may penfold stepped towards him.

"as you have sinned so deeply," she said, in a low tone, "you had better make reparation while you may and confess all, so as to release myles from prison. meanwhile, i will go for a doctor."

he signed her feebly to remain.

"no doctor can do me any good," he said faintly, "but i will tell all. mr. dowker will, perhaps, write it down, and if i'm not too far gone i'll--sign it."

"i will write your confession," said norwood, and, sitting down at the desk, he took up a pen and waited.

it was a strange scene. ellersby lying on the floor with his eyes half closed, balscombe leaning against the desk, with his clothes all torn and a white haggard face, and may penfold standing beside dowker, looking with pitying eyes on the dying man at her feet.

as he knew he had not long to live, ellersby commenced at once:

"i am, as you know, the son of a west indian, and came to england to be educated. i was brought up, in early childhood, by a negro nurse, and before i left barbadoes she gave me an arrow-head, which, she told me, was steeped in deadly poison, and that one scratch would kill. something to do with their obi business, i suppose. she told me to use it on my enemies, but i was not so savage as she was, though i have got negro blood in my veins, and i did not bother much about it. i finished my education and went into society. one time, while down at folkestone, i met amelia dicksfall, and loved her--you do not know how i loved her--with all the mad passion of a creole. she led me on till i was her slave and then refused to marry me, for at least two years--for what reason i was then ignorant, but now i know it was because she wanted to marry a title, and kept me in hand so as to become my wife if she failed to realise her ambition. i went abroad and when i returned a short time ago, i found she had married balscombe. i saw her and reproached her with her treachery, but she only laughed at me. then i heard how she carried on with calliston and swore i would kill her if she preferred him to me. she denied that she cared for him, and then i heard about her projected elopement and determined to make one more appeal to her. if that failed i took an oath i would kill her with the poisoned arrow-head. i thought i would see her on that night, so, dressing myself in evening dress, i put the arrow head in my pocket and went along to park lane. i was told she had gone to the countess of kerstoke's ball and, thinking this was a mere subterfuge on her part, i thought i would go to calliston's chambers and see him. i went along to his rooms in piccadilly, but as i did not know where they were it was some time before i found them. i was going in when i saw balscombe waiting about, and wondered what he was doing there. while thus waiting a woman came out, and i recognised lady balscombe at once. i saw sir rupert go after her and witnessed their dispute under the lamp. i saw him wrench off the locket and then lady balscombe fled. i followed, and found her wandering vaguely about in the fog. she recognised me and we had a stormy interview. i insisted on her coming to my hotel and going away with me in the morning, pointing out that now her husband had seen her coming out of calliston's chambers he would apply for a divorce. i then asked her about the letters and she told me where they were. i said i would get them, and then sir rupert would never know with whom she had gone away. she agreed to go with me, and went as far as jermyn street; then she refused to go further, saying she loved calliston and hated me. she insisted on going down to shoreham in the morning, and taunted me so that i got mad with anger and determined to kill her. so i apparently agreed to what she said and asked her to kiss me for the last time. she did so, and when i was embracing her i wounded her in the neck with the poisoned arrow-head. she thought it was only a pin pricking her, but when she was dying i told her what i had done and said that now she could never be any other man's mistress or wife. she died shortly afterwards, and then i thought about saving myself, so went along to the countess of kerstoke's ball, in order to prove an alibi should it be necessary. in coming back i went up the steps where i had left her to see if she was still there, thinking the body might have been discovered. it was still lying there, however, so i called the policeman. the rest you know. as to the arrow-head, i placed it in there in looking for the letters, in order to throw the blame on balscombe, because i knew all his movements on that night were in favour of the presumption of his having committed the crime."

he paused at this point, for his eyes were becoming glazed and his voice was faint and weak. norwood had written out the words that had fallen from his lips, and now brought the paper and a pen, in order for him to sign it. the dying man raised himself on his elbow with an effort and signed his name with difficulty in the place indicated by the lawyer. when this was done, balscombe and norwood affixed their signatures as witnesses; then the latter placed the confession in an envelope.

the action of the poison being very rapid, ellersby was now in a half-comatose condition; his eyes being closed and his breathing stertorous. he began to speak again in a drowsy voice, which sounded as if he was far away:

"it's the irony of fate . . . brought me here . . . to my death. i came to conquer and remain to die . . . . . . . . . the old greeks were right . . . . . . . man . . . sport of fate . . . . . . nemesis . . . . wins hands down . . . . . . . if there is . . . . . . world . . . . . . . . beyond . . . . i . . . i . . . . find . . . . ."

his slow monotonous voice stopped here and his head fell back; to all appearances he was asleep, but the onlookers knew it was his last earthly sleep, and when he awoke it would be in another world.

the calm placid light of the evening stole softly through the windows and shone on the still face of the dead man, and on the awe-struck spectators.