"Try no more--well, I won't say lies, though they are confounded
lies--what I mean is, no further evasion, Mr. Goad. Sylvester's name
is enough, Sir. Here is the card of your firm, with your own note of
delivery on the back, handed by you to my cousin, the Colonel. And here
stands the lady who saw you do it."

"Major, I will do my very best to remember. I am here, there, every
where--China one day, Peru the next, Siberia the day after. And this
young lady found the nugget, did she? How wonderfully lucky she must
be!"

"I am lucky; I find out every thing; and I shall find out you, Mr.
Goad." Thus I spoke on the spur of the moment, and I could not have
spoken better after a month of consultation. Rogues are generally
superstitious. Mr. Goad glanced at me with a shudder, as I had gazed
at him some three years back; and then he dropped his bad, oily-looking
eyes.

"I make mistakes sometimes," he said, "as to where I have been and where
I have not. If this young lady saw me there, it stands to reason that I
may have been there. I have a brother extremely similar. He goes about a
good deal also. Probably you saw my brother."

"I saw no brother of yours, but yourself. Yourself--your mean and
cowardly self--and I shall bring you to justice."

"Well, well," he replied, with a poor attempt to turn the matter
lightly; "I never contradict ladies; it is an honor to be so observed by
them. Now, Major, can you give me any good reason for drawing upon a bad
memory? My time is valuable. I can not refer to such by-gone matters for
nothing."

"We will not bribe you, if that is what you mean," Major Hockin made
answer, scornfully. "This is a criminal case, and we have evidence you
little dream of. Our only offer is--your own safety, if you make a clean
breast of it. We are on the track of a murderer, and your connection
with him will ruin you. Unless you wish to stand in the dock at his
side, you will tell us every thing."

"Sir, this is violent language."

"And violent acts will follow it: if you do not give up your principal,
and every word you know about him, you will leave this room in custody.
I have Cosmopolitan Jack outside, and the police at a sign from him will
come."

"Is this job already in the hands of the police, then?"

"No, not yet. I resolved to try you first. If you refuse, it will be
taken up at once; and away goes your last chance, Sir."

Mr. Goad's large face became like a field of conflicting passions