accepted the
invitation.

"Ah!" said Kilsip, in his soft, low voice, rubbing his lean white hands
together, as they sat over their drinks, "you're a lucky man to have
laid your hands on that hansom cab murderer so quickly."

"Yes; I flatter myself I did manage it pretty well," said Gorby,
lighting his pipe. "I had no idea that it would be so simple--though,
mind you, it required a lot of thought before I got a proper start."

"I suppose you're pretty sure he's the man you want?" pursued Kilsip,
softly, with a brilliant flash of his black eyes.

"Pretty sure, indeed!" retorted Mr. Gorby, scornfully, "there ain't no
pretty sure about it. I'd take my Bible oath he's the man. He and Whyte
hated one another. He says to Whyte, 'I'll kill you, if I've got to do
it in the open street.' He meets Whyte drunk, a fact which he
acknowledges himself; he clears out, and the cabman swears he comes
back; then he gets into the cab with a living man, and when he comes
out leaves a dead one; he drives to East Melbourne and gets into the
house at a time which his landlady can prove--just the time that a cab
would take to drive from the Grammar School on the St. Kilda Road. If
you ain't a fool, Kilsip, you'll see as there's no doubt about it."

"It looks all square enough," said Kilsip, who wondered what evidence
Calton could have found to contradict such a plain statement of fact.
"And what's his defence?"

"Mr. Calton's the only man as knows that," answered Gorby, finishing
his drink; "but, clever and all as he is, he can't put anything in,
that can go against my evidence."

"Don't you be too sure of that," sneered Kilsip, whose soul was
devoured with envy.

"Oh! but I am," retorted Gorby, getting as red as a turkey-cock at the
sneer. "You're jealous, you are, because you haven't got a finger in
the pie."

"Ah! but I may have yet."

"Going a-hunting yourself, are you?" said Gorby, with an indignant
snort. "A-hunting for what--for a man as is already caught?"

"I don't believe you've got the right man," remarked Kilsip,
deliberately.

Mr. Gorby looked upon him with a smile of pity.

"No! of course you don't, just because I've caught him; perhaps, when
you see him hanged, you'll believe it then?"

"You're a smart man, you are," retorted Kilsip; "but you ain't the Pope
to be infallible."

"And what grounds have you for saying he's not the right man?" demanded
Gorby.

Kilsip smiled, and stole softly across the room like a