s daughter. I replenished my pen, which was full of a chemical
that would enable me, if necessary, to identify any letter in the
writing of which it had been used. When I placed my pen, which is a
self-filler, in the ink, I forced this liquid into the bottle."

The inspector merely stared. Words had forsaken him for the moment.

"It was then necessary to wait until the ink in Miss Crayne's pen
had become exhausted, and she had to replenish her supply of paper
from her father's study. After that discovery was inevitable."

"But suppose she had denied it?" questioned the inspector.

"There was the ink which she alone used, and which I could
identify," was the reply.

"Why did you ask Gray to be present?" enquired Freynes.

"As his name had been associated with the scandal it seemed only
fair," remarked Malcolm Sage, then turning to Inspector Murdy he
said, "I shall leave it to you, Murdy, to see that a proper
confession is obtained. The case has had such publicity that Mr.
Blade's innocence must be made equally public."

"You may trust me, Mr. Sage," said the inspector. "But why did the
curate refuse to say anything?"

"Because he is a high-minded and chivalrous gentleman," was the
quiet reply.

"He knew?" cried Freynes.

"Obviously," said Malcolm Sage. "It is the only explanation of his
silence. I taxed him with it after the girl had been taken away, and
he acknowledged that his suspicions amounted almost to certainty."

"Yet he stayed behind," murmured the inspector with the air of a man
who does not understand. "I wonder why?"

"To minister to the afflicted, Murdy," said Malcolm Sage. "That is
the mission of the Church."

"I suppose you meant that French case when you referred to the
'master-key,'" remarked the inspector, as if to change the subject.

Malcolm Sage nodded.

"But how do you account for Miss Crayne writing such letters about
herself?" enquired the inspector, with a puzzled expression in his
eyes. "Pretty funny letters some of them for a parson's daughter."

"I'm not a pathologist, Murdy," remarked Malcolm Sage drily, "but
when you try to suppress hysteria in a young girl by sternness, it's
about as effectual as putting ointment on a plague-spot."

"Sex-repression?" queried Freynes.

Malcolm Sage shrugged his shoulders; then after a pause, during
which he lighted the pipe he had just re-filled, he added:

"When you are next in Great Russell Street, drop in at the British
Museum and