, "before signing
that warrant, were I in your place, to do so would be to render yourself
the tool of those who are plotting my ruin, and ready to bear false
witness that they may accomplish it. I refer," and he waved a hand
towards the countess and his brother, "to the late Lord Ostermore's
mistress and his natural son, there."

In their utter stupefaction at the unexpectedness and seeming wildness
of the statement, neither mother nor son could find a word to say. No
more could Mr. Templeton for a moment. Then, suddenly, wrathfully: "What
are you saying, sir?" he roared.

"The truth, sir."

"The truth?" echoed the secretary.

"Ay, sir--the truth. Have ye never heard of it?"

Mr. Templeton sat back again. "I begin to think," said he, surveying
through narrowing eyes the slender graceful figure before him, "that her
ladyship is right that you are mad; unless--unless you are mad of the
same madness that beset Ulysses. You remember?"

"Let us have done," cried Rotherby in a burst of anger, leaping to his
feet. "Let us have done, I say! Are we to waste the day upon this Tom
o' Bedlam? Write him down as Caryll--Justin Caryll--'tis the name he's
known by; and let Green see to the rest."

Mr. Templeton made an impatient sound, and poised his pen.

"Ye are not to suppose, sir," Mr. Caryll stayed him, "that I cannot
support my statements. I have by me proofs--irrefragable proofs of what
I say."

"Proofs?" The word seemed to come from, every member of that little
assembly--if we except Mr. Green, whose face was beginning to betray
his uneasiness. He was not so ready as the others to believe, that Mr.
Caryll was mad. For him, the situation asked some other explanation.

"Ay--proofs," said Mr. Caryll. He had drawn the case from his pocket
again. From this he took the birth-certificate, and placed it before Mr.
Templeton, "Will you glance at that, sir--to begin, with?--"

Mr. Templeton complied. His face became more and more grave. He looked
at Mr. Caryll; then at Rotherby, who was scowling, and at her ladyship,
who was breathing hard. His glance returned to Mr. Caryll.

"You are the person designated here?" he inquired.

"As I can abundantly prove," said Mr. Caryll. "I have no lack of friends
in London who will bear witness to that much."

"Yet," said Mr. Templeton, frowning, perplexed, "this does not make
you what you claim to be. Rather does it show you to be his late
lordship's--"

"There's more to come," sai