n my presence, when charged by Sir Oliver with the
murder of my brother and the kidnapping of himself, admit those charges.
Can I make it any plainer, sirs?"

Lord Henry spread his hands. "After that, Killigrew, I do not think we
can go further in this matter. Sir Oliver must go with us to England,
and there take his trial."

But there was one present--that officer named Youldon--whose wits, it
seems, were of keener temper.

"By your leave, my lord," he now interposed, and he turned to question
the witness. "What was the occasion on which Sir Oliver forced this
admission from his brother?"

Truthfully she answered. "At his house in Algiers on the night he...."
She checked suddenly, perceiving then the trap that had been set for
her. And the others perceived it also. Sir John leapt into the breach
which Youldon had so shrewdly made in her defences.

"Continue, pray," he bade her. "On the night he...."

"On the night we arrived there," she answered desperately, the colour
now receding slowly from her face.

"And that, of course," said Sir John slowly, mockingly almost, "was
the first occasion on which you heard this explanation of Sir Oliver's
conduct?"

"It was," she faltered--perforce.

"So that," insisted Sir John, determined to leave her no loophole
whatsoever, "so that until that night you had naturally continued to
believe Sir Oliver to be the murderer of your brother?"

She hung her head in silence, realizing that the truth could not prevail
here since she had hampered it with a falsehood, which was now being
dragged into the light.

"Answer me!" Sir John commanded.

"There is no need to answer," said Lord Henry slowly, in a voice of
pain, his eyes lowered to the table. "There can, of course, be but
one answer. Mistress Rosamund has told us that he did not abduct her
forcibly; that she went with him of her own free will and married him;
and she has urged that circumstance as a proof of her conviction of his
innocence. Yet now it becomes plain that at the time she left England
with him she still believed him to be her brother's slayer. Yet she asks
us to believe that he did not abduct her." He spread his hands again and
pursed his lips in a sort of grieved contempt.

"Let us make an end, a' God's name!" said Sir John, rising.

"Ah, wait!" she cried. "I swear that all that I have told you is
true--all but the matter of the abduction. I admit that, but I condoned
it in view of what I have since learn