ve no suspicion of anyone? You don't think that her manservant--I
forget the fellow's name--fired the shot? Remember, he was not in the
room at the time!"

"I feel confident that he did not. He was far too distressed at the
terrible affair," said Hugh. "The outrage must have been committed by
someone to whom the preservation of the secret of my father's end was of
most vital importance."

"Agreed," replied the man with the black glove. "The problem we have to
solve is who was responsible for your father's death."

"Yes," said Hugh. "If that shot had not been fired I should have known
the truth."

"You think, then, that Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo would have told you
the truth?" asked the bristly-haired man with a mysterious smile.

"Yes. She would."

"Well, Mr. Henfrey, I think I am not of your opinion."

"You think possibly she would have implicated herself if she had told me
the truth?"

"I do. But the chief reason I asked you to call and see me to-night is
to learn for what reason you have been induced to go on a visit to this
Mrs. Bond."

"Because Benton suggested it. He told me that Scotland Yard knew of my
presence in Kensington, making further residence there dangerous."

"H'm!" And the man with the black glove paused again.

"You don't like Benton, do you?"

"I have no real reason to dislike him. He has always been very friendly
towards me--as he was to my late father. The only thing which causes
me to hold aloof from him as much as I can is the strange clause in my
father's will."

"Strange clause?" echoed the old man. "What clause?"

"My father, in his will, cut me off every benefit he could unless I
married Benton's adopted daughter, Louise. If I marry her, then I obtain
a quarter of a million. I at first thought of disputing the will, but
Mr. Charman, our family solicitor, says that it is perfectly in order.
The will was made in Paris two years before his death. He went over
there on some financial business."

"Was Benton with him?" asked Mr. Peters.

"No. Benton went to New York about two months before."

"H'm! And how soon after your father's return did he come home?"

"I think it was about three months. He was in America five months
altogether, I believe."

The old man, still curled in his chair, smoked his cigar in silence.
Apparently he was thinking deeply.

"So Benton has induced you to go down to Shapley in order that you may
be near his adopted daughter, in the hope that you