stare became fascinated; it ran on as though nothing could ever happen
to break it off. To Queed it seemed as if everything in the world had
dropped away but those brilliant eyes, frightened yet unafraid, boring
into his.

Nicolovius broke the silence. The triumph of his intelligence over his
emotions showed in the fact that he attempted no denial.

"Well?" he said somewhat thickly. "Well?--Well?"

Under the look of the younger man, he was beginning to break. Into the
old eyes had sprung a deadly terror, a look as though his immortal soul
might hang on what the young man was going to say next. To answer this
look, a blind impulse in Queed bade him strike out, to say or do
something; and his reason, which was always detached and impersonal,
was amazed to hear his voice saying:--

"It's all right, professor. Not a thing is going to happen."

The old man licked his lips. "You ... will stay on here?"

And Queed's voice answered: "As long as you want me."

Nicolovius, who had been born Surface, suffered a moment of collapse. He
fell back in his chair, and covered his face with his hands.

The dying efforts of the June sun still showed in the pretty
sitting-room, though the town clocks were striking seven. From without
floated in the voices of merry passers; eddies of the day's celebration
broke even into this quiet street. Queed sat down in a big-armed rocker,
and looked out the window into the pink west.

So, in a minute's time and by a wholly chance happening, the mystery was
out at last. Professor Nicolovius, the bland recluse of Mrs. Paynter's,
and Henry G. Surface, political arch-traitor, ex-convict, and falsest of
false friends, were one and the same man.

The truth had been instantly plain to Queed when the name had blazed up
at him from the envelope on the floor. It was as though Fate herself had
tossed that envelope under his eyes, as the answer to all his
questionings. Not an instant's doubt had troubled him; and now a score
of memories were marshaling themselves before him to show that his first
flashing certainty had been sound. As for the book, it was clearly from
the library of the old man's youth, kept and hidden away for some
reason, when nearly everything else had been destroyed. Between the
musty pages the accusing letter had lain forgotten for thirty years,
waiting for this moment.

He turned and glanced once at the silent figure, huddled back in the
chair with covered eyes; the unhappy old ma