etired; and Davis's
lawyer, rising, approached the dock and whispered something to the
prisoner.

"What's the betting?" murmured Grog.

"Even as to the first charge. Two to one for a verdict of manslaughter."

"Take all you can get for me on the first," said Grog, "and I'll take
the odds on the other in hundreds. It's a sort of a hedge for me. There,
let's lose no time; they 'll be back soon."

In a few minutes after this brief conversation, the jury returned into
Court. Their finding was Not Guilty of murder, Guilty of manslaughter
only.

Davis listened to the decision calmly, and then, having pencilled down
a few figures in his note-book, he muttered, "Not so bad, neither; seven
hundred on the double event!" So occupied was he in his calculations,
that he had not heard a recommendation to mercy, which the jury had
appended, though somewhat informally, to their verdict.

"What a pot of money one might have had against that!" said Davis. "Is
n't it strange none of us should ever have thought of it!"

The Judge reserved sentence till he had thought over the recommendation,
and the trial was over.

CHAPTER XXXVI. THE END OF ALL THINGS

From the day of Davenport Dunn's death to the trial of Kit Davis three
whole months elapsed,--a short period in the term of human life, but
often sufficient to include great events. It only took three months,
once on a time, for a certain great Emperor to break up his camp at
Boulogne-sur-Mer and lay Austria at his feet! In the same short space
the self-same Emperor regained and lost his own great empire. What
wonder, then, if three months brought great and important changes to the
fortunes of some of the individuals in this story!

I have not any pretension to try to interest my reader for the
circumstances by which Charles Conway recovered the ancient title and
the estates that rightfully belonged to him, nor to ask his company
through the long and intricate course of law proceedings by which this
claim was established. Enough to say that amidst the documents which
contributed to this success, none possessed the same conclusive force
as that discovered so accidentally by Sybella Kellett. It formed the
connecting link in a most important chain of evidence, and was in a
great measure the cause of ultimate success. It rarely happens that the
great mass of the public feels any strong interest in the issue of cases
like this; the very rank of the litigants removing them, by r