is, indeed, in dispute. And were it not for my
devotion to the cause I would not now be in my present terrible
plight--doomed to wander from pillar to post with that thing" (she
pointed with a shudder to the box into which Elmer was still gloomily
poking ice)-"chained to me like a--like a----" She hesitated for a
word, and Cleggett, tactlessly enough, with some vague recollection of
a classical tale in his mind, suggested:

"Like a corpse."

Lady Agatha turned pale. She gazed at Cleggett with terror-stricken
eyes, her beautiful face became almost haggard in an instant; he
thought she was about to faint again, but she did not. As he looked
upon the change his words had wrought, filled with wonder and
compunction, Cleggett suddenly divined that her occasional flashes of
gayety had been, all along, merely the forced vivacity of a brave and
clever woman who was making a gallant fight against total collapse.

"Mr. Cleggett," she said, in a voice that was scarcely louder than a
whisper, "I am going to confide everything to you--the whole truth. I
will spare myself nothing; I will throw myself upon your mercy.

"I firmly believe, Mr. Cleggett--I am practically certain--that the box
there, upon which Elmer is sitting, contains the body of Reginald
Maltravers, natural son of the tenth Earl of Claiborne, and the cousin
of my late husband, Sir Archibald Fairhaven."

CHAPTER VI

LADY AGATHA'S STORY

It was with the greatest difficulty that Cleggett repressed a start.
Another man might have shown the shock he felt. But Cleggett had the
iron nerve of a Bismarck and the fine manner of a Richelieu. He did
not even permit his eyes to wander towards the box in question. He
merely sat and waited.

Lady Agatha, having brought herself to the point of revelation, seemed
to find a difficulty in proceeding. Cleggett, mutely asking
permission, lighted a cigarette.

"Oh--if you will!" said Lady Agatha, extending her hand towards the
case. He passed it over, and when she had chosen one of the little
rolls and lighted it she said:

"Mr. Cleggett, have you ever lived in England?"

"I have never even visited England."

"I wish you knew England." She watched the curling smoke from her
tobacco as it drifted across the table. "If you knew England you would
comprehend so much more readily some parts of my story.

"But, being an American, you can have no adequate conception of the
conservatism that still prevails in certai