and cheating the scaffold, but have decided
that Ilderim will get his deserts better if I hang, and I may perhaps
get rid of him, thus, for ever.

"Will you come? I would not ask it of any living soul but you, and I ask
it because your presence would show me that you blindly believe that it
was not John Robin Ross-Ellison who killed poor Mrs. Dearman, and that
would enable me to die quite happy. Your presence would also be a great
help to me. It would help me to feel that, whatever I have lived, I die
a Briton--that if I could not live without Ilderim Dost Mahommed I can
die without him. But this must seem lunatic wanderings to you.

"I apologize for writing to you and I hesitated long. At length I said,
'I will tell him the truth--that the deed was not done by Ross-Ellison
and perhaps he will understand, and come'. Mike--_John Robin
Ross-Ellison did not murder Mrs. Dearman_.

"Your distracted and broken-hearted ex-friend,

"J.R. ROSS-ELLISON."

"He _was_ 'queer' at times," said Captain Michael Malet-Marsac. "There
was a kink somewhere. The bravest, coolest, keenest chap I ever met, the
finest fighting-man, the truest comrade and friend,--and from time to
time something queer peeped out, and one was puzzled.... Madness in the
family, I suppose.... Poor devil, poor, poor devil!" and Captain
Malet-Marsac stamped about and swore, for his eyes tingled and his chin
quivered.

Sec. 3.

Captain Michael Malet-Marsac alighted from his horse at the great gate
of the Gungapur Jail, loosed girths, slid stirrup irons up the leathers
to the saddle, and handed his reins to the orderly who had ridden behind
him.

"Walk the horses up and down," said he, for both were sweating and the
morning was very cold. Perhaps it was the cold that made Captain Michael
Malet-Marsac's strong face so white, made his teeth chatter and his
hands shake. Perhaps it was the cold that made him feel so sick, and
that weakened the tendons of his knees so that he could scarcely
stand--and would fain have thrown himself upon the ground.

With a curious coughing sound, as though he swallowed and cleared his
throat at the same moment, he commenced to address another order or
remark to the mounted sepoy, choked, and turned his back upon him.

Striding to the gate, he struck upon it loudly with his hunting-crop,
and turning, waved the waiting orderly away.

Not for a king's ransom could he have spoken at that moment. He realized
that something w