suspicious manner which has been reported to you."

He was caught in his own toils and saw it. Muttering a deep curse, he
drew back, while a startled "Humph!" broke from the doctor, followed by
a quick, "Is that true? Did you tell him that, Mr. Benson?"

For reply the now thoroughly alarmed villain leaped at my throat. "Off
with that toggery! Let us see your face! I shall and will know who you
are."

But I resisted for another moment while I added: "It is, then,
established to your satisfaction that I am really the man who has worn
the yellow domino this evening. Very well, now look at me, one and all,
and say if you think I am likely to be a person to destroy Mr. Benson."
And with a quick gesture I threw aside my mask, and yielded the fatal
yellow domino to the impatient hands of Mr. Hartley Benson.

The result was a cry of astonishment from those to whom the face thus
revealed was a strange one, and a curse deep and loud from him to whom
the shock of that moment's surprise must have been nearly overwhelming.

"Villain!" he shrieked, losing his self-possession in a sudden burst of
fury; "spy! informer! I understand it all now. You have been set over
me by my brother. Instructed by him, you have dared to enter this house,
worm yourself into its secrets, and by a deviltry only equalled by your
presumption, taken advantage of your position to poison my father and
fling the dreadful consequences of your crime in the faces of his
mourning family. It was a plot well laid; but it is foiled, sir, foiled,
as you will see when I have you committed to prison to-morrow."

"Mr. Benson," I returned, shaking him loose as I would a feather, "this
is all very well; but in your haste and surprise you have made a slight
mistake. You call me a spy; so I am; but a spy backed by the United
States Government is not a man to be put lightly into prison. I am a
detective, sir, connected at present with the Secret Service at
Washington. My business is to ferret out crime and recognize a rogue
under any disguise and in the exercise of any vile or deceptive
practices." And I looked him steadily in the face.

Then indeed his cheek turned livid, and the eye which had hitherto
preserved its steadiness sought the floor.

"A detective!" murmured Miss Carrie, shrinking back from the cringing
form of the brother whom, but a few hours before, she had deemed every
thing that was noble and kind.

"A detective!" echoed Edith, brightening like a ro