he
pencil obliterates both names. Now we arrive at Angus McKeller, an
author of some note, as you are well aware, deriving a good income
from his books and a better one from his plays; a canny Scot, so we
may rub his name from our paper and our memory. How do my erasures
correspond with yours, Monsieur Valmont?'

'They correspond exactly, Mr. Dacre.'

'I am flattered to hear it. There remains one name untouched, Mr
Lionel Dacre, the descendant, as I have said, of robbers.'

'I have not said so, Mr. Dacre.'

'Ah! my dear Valmont, the politeness of your country asserts itself.
Let us not be deluded, but follow our inquiry wherever it leads. I
suspect Lionel Dacre. What do you know of his circumstances before the
dinner of the twenty-third?'

As I made no reply he looked up at me with his frank, boyish face
illumined by a winning smile.

'You know nothing of his circumstances?' he asked.

'It grieves me to state that I do. Mr. Lionel Dacre was penniless on
the night of the dinner.'

'Oh, don't exaggerate, Monsieur Valmont,' cried Dacre with a gesture
of pathetic protest; 'his pocket held one sixpence, two pennies, and a
halfpenny. How came you to suspect he was penniless?'

'I knew he ordered a case of champagne from the London representative
of Camelot Freres, and was refused unless he paid the money down.'

'Quite right, and then when you were talking to Hopper you saw that
case of champagne delivered. Excellent! excellent! Monsieur Valmont.
But will a man steal, think you, even to supply himself with so
delicious a wine as this we have been tasting? And, by the way,
forgive my neglect, allow me to fill your glass, Monsieur Valmont.'

'Not another drop, if you will excuse me, Mr. Dacre.'

'Ah, yes, champagne should not be mixed with evidence. When we have
finished, perhaps. What further proof have you discovered, monsieur?'

'I hold proof that Mr. Dacre was threatened with bankruptcy, if, on the
twenty-fourth, he did not pay a bill of seventy-eight pounds that had
been long outstanding. I hold proof that this was paid, not on the
twenty-fourth, but on the twenty-sixth. Mr. Dacre had gone to the
solicitor and assured him he would pay the money on that date,
whereupon he was given two days' grace.'

'Ah, well, he was entitled to three, you know, in law. Yes, there,
Monsieur Valmont, you touch the fatal point. The threat of bankruptcy
will drive a man in Dacre's position to almost any crime. Bankruptcy
to