arding it with an air of extreme perplexity. "I could
have sworn it was mine, had it been attached to any other document. I
think Forbes's handwriting is not so well imitated. But it is the very
ink I use, and mine is a peculiar signature."

It was a very peculiar and old-fashioned signature, with a flourish
underneath it not unlike a whip-handle, with the lash caught round it in
the middle; but that did not make it the more difficult to forge, as I
humbly suggested. Mr. Huntingdon wrote his name upon a paper, and two or
three of the gentlemen tried to imitate the flourish, but vainly. They
gave it up with a smile upon their grave faces.

"You have been careful not to let a hint of this matter drop from you,
Mr. Wilcox?" said the Postmaster-General.

"Not a syllable, my lord," I answered.

"It is imperatively necessary that the secret should be kept. You would
be removed from the temptation of telling it, if you had an appointment
in some office abroad. The packet-agency at Alexandria is vacant, and I
will have you appointed to it at once."

It would be a good advance from my present situation, and would doubtless
prove a stepping-stone to other and better appointments; but I had a
mother living at Fazeley, bedridden and paralytic, who had no pleasure in
existence except having me to dwell under the same roof with her. My
head was growing more and more dizzy, and a strange vagueness was
creeping over me.

"Gentlemen," I muttered, "I have a bedridden mother whom I cannot leave.
I was not to blame, gentlemen." I fancied there was a stir and movement
at the table, but my eyes were dim, and in another second I had lost
consciousness.

When I came to myself, in two or three minutes, I found that Mr.
Huntingdon was kneeling on the floor beside me, supporting my head, while
our secretary held a glass of wine to my lips. I rallied as quickly as
possible, and staggered to my feet; but the two gentlemen placed me in
the chair against which I had been leaning, and insisted upon my
finishing the wine before I tried to speak.

"I have not tasted food all day," I said, faintly.

"Then, my good fellow, you shall go home immediately," said the
Postmaster-General; "but be on your guard! Not a word of this must
escape you. Are you a married man?"

"No, my lord," I answered.

"So much the better," he added, smiling. "You can keep a secret from
your mother, I dare say. We rely upon your honour."

The secretary