point--the
hand ought to be the same as that on the sale registration form, and I
might have been expected to recognize it, but I can't remember all the
writing I see. However, we'll compare it with the other signature
to-morrow."

"When you do so, you'll find a difference."

"Ah!" said Laxton. "Then whose hand is this?"

"Cyril Jernyngham's. It was written in my presence, and what's more
important, in the presence of another man. Now will you tell me what the
fellow who made the deal with you was like?"

Laxton did so, and Prescott thought the description indicated Wandle,
though he was not the only man in the neighborhood of Sebastian to whom
it might apply.

"Did you notice how he was dressed?" he asked.

"He had on a suit of new brown clothes."

Prescott sat still, his brows knitted, his right hand clenched. The
reason why the clothes had been hidden near his house was obvious, but
there was something else: a blurred memory that was growing into shape.
Ever since he had heard about them from Muriel, he had been trying to
think where he had seen the clothes, and at last he seemed to hold a
clue. In another few moments it led him to the truth; everything was
clear. He had once met Wandle driving toward the settlement wearing such
a suit, and by good fortune he had shortly afterward been overtaken by a
farmer who must have seen the man. In his excitement he struck the table.

"Now I know!" he cried. "The man who forged Jernyngham's name hid his
clothes near my house to fix the thing on me. I owe you a good deal for
your help in a puzzling matter."

The agent was sympathetic, and after Prescott had given him an outline of
his connection with the case, they sat talking over its details. Laxton
had a keen intelligence and his comments on several points were valuable.
When Prescott went to sleep it was with a weight off his mind; but his
mood changed the next day and he traveled back to Sebastian in a very
grim humor.

Open and just as he was in all his dealings, Wandle's treachery
infuriated him. There would, he felt, have been more extenuation for the
trick had the man killed Jernyngham, but that he should conspire to throw
the blackest suspicion on a neighbor in order to enjoy the proceeds of a
petty theft was abominable. He must be made to suffer for it. However,
Prescott did not mean to trouble the police. He had had enough of their
cautious methods. He determined to secure a proof of Wandle's guilt,
una