that the friend whom he had trusted had turned upon him, he
would face the music rather than add another crime to his discredit
and dishonour.

Philip Poland, alias Louis Lessar and half-a-score of other names,
halted, and raised his pale, repentant face to Heaven for help and
guidance.

II

CONCERNS TWO STRANGERS

That night Phil Poland glanced longingly around the well-furnished
dining-room with its white napery, its antique plate, and its great
bowl of yellow roses in the centre of the table between the silver
candelabra with white silk shades. Alone he sat at his dinner, being
waited upon by Felix, the thin-faced, silent Frenchman in black who
was so devoted to his master and so faithful in his service.

It was the last time he would eat his dinner there, he reflected. The
choice of two things lay before him--flight, or arrest.

Sonia was on a visit to an old school-fellow in London, and would not
return until the morrow. For some reasons he was glad, for he desired
to be alone--alone in order to think.

Since the abrupt departure of his visitor he had become a changed man.
His usually merry face was hard and drawn, his cheeks pale, with red
spots in the centre, and about his clean-shaven mouth a hardness quite
unusual.

Dinner concluded, he had strolled out upon the lawn, and, reclining in
a long deck-chair, sipped his coffee and curacao, his face turned to
the crimson sundown showing across the dark edge of the forest. He was
full of dark forebodings.

The end of his career--a scandalous career--was near. The truth was
out!

As he lay back with his hot, fevered head upon the cushion of the long
cane chair, his dead cigar between his nerveless fingers, a thousand
bitter thoughts crowded upon him. He had striven to reform, he had
tried hard to turn aside and lead an honest life, yet it seemed as
though his good intentions had only brought upon him exposure and
disaster.

He thought it all over. His had, indeed, been an amazing career of
duplicity. What a sensation would be caused when the truth became
revealed! At first he had heaped opprobrium upon the head of the man
who had been his friend, but now, on mature consideration, he realized
that Du Cane's motive in exposing him was twofold--in order to save
himself, and also to curry favour in certain high quarters affected by
the mysterious death of the young Parliamentary Under-Secretary who
had placed to his lips that fatal cigar. Self-prese