m, it stands only as a time of folly that may be brushed aside and of
sin that may be outlived. Probably you were no worse in the days of your
youth, General, than ninety-nine men out of every hundred, but----" He
gave his shoulders a shrug, and broke off.

But of a sudden he reached round and took a packet of letters from the
tail pockets of his evening coat, and threw them to the stricken man.

"Carry those things to Lady Clavering and let her burn them with her own
hands," he said. "They are letters which caused last night's crime--the
letters of Mademoiselle Marise de Morcerf, a pretty school-girl, who
wrote them in all innocence to Lieutenant Raynor out there in Malta, all
those years ago. They were stolen by the man who was christened under
the name of Anatole de Vellon, and died under that of Count Franz de
Louvisan."

The General plucked up the letters with a wild sort of eagerness and sat
forward in his chair, breathing hard.

"You know then, you know?" he said, in a shaking voice, the pallor on
his face deepening until he was absolutely ghastly. "Is there, then, no
keeping anything from you, that you are able to unearth secrets such as
this--things that no one but our two wretched selves knew in all the
world? And you know how that man, that De Louvisan, had blackmailed
her?"

"Yes, General, I know. But the source of my knowledge is by no means so
miraculous as you seem to fancy. It came in part from those letters and
in part from your guest, Lord St. Ulmer."

"St. Ulmer? St. Ulmer? What can he know of this? He is in no way
concerned. He is little better than a stranger to me, despite his
relationship to my wife."

"Nevertheless, he knows more than you fancy, General. He, too, was a
visitor to Gleer Cottage last night. And he went, as you went, my
friend, determined to be rid of the danger of Count Franz de Louvisan's
tongue, even if he had to descend to crime to do it."

"St. Ulmer! St. Ulmer!" repeated the General with an air of
bewilderment. "Why should he? What reason could he have for dreading the
man?"

"A very good one, as you will see when I explain to you that St. Ulmer,
as you call him, has no more right to the title than I myself!"

"An impostor!" gasped both the General and Mr. Narkom with one voice.

"Yes, an impostor," said Cleek quietly. "I recognized him directly I was
able to get face to face with him. He was known as Paul the Panther,
though Paul Berton is his name, an Apache, a