d not once realised, and which, when its full meaning broke
upon him, crushed the spirit out of him.

He made no resistance, no protest, no complaint as they hustled him back
into the van, and from the van to the cell which was to be his dreary
lodging for those three days. He felt degraded, dishonoured, disgraced,
and as he sat hour after hour brooding over his lot, his mind, already
overwrought, lost its courage and let go its hope.

Suppose he really had done something to be ashamed of? Suppose he had
all along had his vague suspicions of the honesty of the Corporation,
and yet had continued to serve them? Suppose, with the best of
intentions, he had shut his eyes wilfully to what he might and must have
seen? Suppose, in fact, his negligence had been criminal? How was he
ever to hold up his head again and face the world like an honest man,
and say he had defrauded no man?

And then there came up in terrible array that long list of customers to
the Corporation whom he had lured and enticed by promises he had never
taken the trouble to inquire into to part with their money. And the
burden of their loss lay like an incubus on his spirit, till he actually
persuaded himself he was guilty.

I need not sadden the reader with dwelling on the misery of those three
days. Any one almost could have endured them better than Reginald. He
began a letter to Horace, but he tore it up when half-written. He drew
up a statement of his own defence, but when fact after fact appeared in
array on the paper it seemed more like an indictment than a defence, and
he tore it up too.

At length the weary suspense was over, and once more he found himself in
the outer air, stepping with almost familiar tread across the pavement
into the van, and taking his place among the waiters in the dim lobby at
the foot of the police-court stairs.

When at last he stood once more in the dock none of his former
bewilderment remained to befriend him. It was all too real this time.
When some one spoke of the "prisoner" he knew it meant himself, and when
they spoke of fraud he knew they referred to something he had done. Oh,
that he could see it all in a dream once more, and wake up to find
himself on the other side!

"Now, Mr Sniff, you've got something to say?" said the magistrate.

"Yes, your worship," replied Mr Sniff, not moving to the witness-box,
but speaking from his seat. "We don't propose to continue this case."

"What? It's a clea