ntrolled
power and energy that is so often possessed by a small but perfect
machine. He bowed to the judge with something of the theatrical in his
manner, and then rested one hand upon the clerk's table.

"Now, naturally, you are wanting to hear the story," he said briskly,
"and I'll make it as brief as possible. But I warn you there's a good
deal to be told, and afterward there'll be work for Scotland Yard, more
work than perhaps they'll care about; but that is another story. To begin
with, the jury, my lord, was undoubtedly, from all signs, about to
convict the prisoner upon a charge of murder--a murder of which he was
entirely innocent. You have heard Merriton's story. Believe me, every
word of it is true--circumstantial evidence to the contrary
notwithstanding.

"In the first place, Dacre Wynne was shot through the temple at the
instigation of that man there," he pointed to Brellier, standing pale and
still between two constables, "foully shot, as many others had been
similarly done to death, because they had ventured forth across the Fens
at night, and were likely to investigate this man's charming little
midnight movements, further than he cared about. To creatures of his like
human life is nothing compared to what it can produce. Men and women are
a means to an end, and that end, the furtherance of his own wealth, his
own future. The epitome of prehistoric selfishness, is it not? Club the
next man that comes along, and steal from his dead body all that he has
worked for. Oh, a pretty sort of a tale this is, I promise you!

"What's that, my lord? What has the Frozen Flame to do with all this?
Why, the answer to that is as simple as A.B.C. The Frozen Flames, or that
most natural of phenomena, marsh-gas--of which I won't weary you with an
explanation--arose from that part of the Fens where the rotting
vegetation was at its worst. What more natural, then, than that this
human fiend should endeavour to shape even this thing to his own ends?
The villagers had always been superstitious of these lights, but their
notice had never been particularly called to them before the story of the
Frozen Flames had been carefully spread from mouth to mouth by Brellier's
tools.

"Then one man, braver than the rest, ventured forth--and never came back.
The story gained credence, even with the more educated few. Another,
unwilling to conform to public opinion, did likewise. And he, too, went
into the great unknown. The list of Brel