reeches' pocket."

And he rose from his chair, picked up the perruque and false mustache
which the other man had dropped upon the floor, and adjusting these on
his head and face he once more presented the appearance of the exiled
Orleans prince.

"But thou'lt show them to me to-night," insisted the smith roughly.

"How can I, mine impatient friend?" quoth de Chavasse lightly, "the hour
is late already."

"Nay! what matter the lateness of the hour? I am oft abroad at night,
early and late, and thou, methinks, hast oft had the midnight hour for
company. When and where wilt meet me?" added Lambert peremptorily, "I
must see those proofs to-night, before many hours are over, lest the
blood in my veins burn my body to ashes with impatience. When wilt meet
me? Eleven? ... Midnight? ... or the small hours of the morn?"

He spoke quickly, jerking out his words through closed teeth, his eyes
burning with inward fever, his fists closing and unclosing with rapid
febrile movements of the fingers.

The pent-up disappointment and rebellion of a whole lifetime against
Fate, was expressed in the man's attitude, the agonizing eagerness which
indeed seemed to be consuming him.

De Chavasse, on the other hand, had become singularly calm. The black
shade as usual hid one of his eyes, masking and distorting the
expression of his face; the false mustache, too, concealed the movements
of his lips, and the more his opponent's eyes tried to search the
schemer's face, the more inscrutable and bland did the latter become.

"Nay, my friend," he said at last, "I do not know that the thought of a
midnight excursion with you appeals to my sense of personal security. I
..."

But with a violent oath, Adam had jumped to his feet, and kicked the
chair away from under him so that it fell backwards with a loud clatter.

"Thou'lt meet me to-night," he said loudly and threateningly now,
"thou'lt meet me on the path near the cliffs of Epple Bay half an hour
before midnight, and if thou hast lied to me, I'll throw thee over and
Thanet then will be rid of thee ... but if thou dost not come, I'll to
my brother Richard even before the church clock of Acol hath sounded the
hour of midnight."

De Chavasse watched him silently for the space of three seconds,
realizing, of course, that he was completely in that man's power, and
also that the smith meant every word that he said. The discovery of the
monstrous fraud by Richard Lambert within the next few ho