dgment Day will find him. Something drove me
to do it; but all the same I'm sorry now it's done--not for him
but myself. I shall clear to-night, with luck, for France. If I
can send an address later I will. Look after Jenny--she's well
rid of the blighter. When things have blown over I may come
back. Tell Albert and tell Flo. Yours,

"R. R."

Brendon examined the letter and the envelope that contained it.

"Have you another communication--something from the past I can
compare with this?" he asked.

Bendigo nodded.

"I reckoned you'd want that," he answered and produced a second
letter from his desk.

It related to Robert Redmayne's engagement to be married and the
writing was identical.

"And what do you think he's done, Mr. Redmayne?" Brendon asked,
pocketing the two communications.

"I think he's done what he hoped to do. At this time of year you'll
see a dozen Spanish and Brittany onion boats lying down by the
Barbican at Plymouth, every day of the week. And if poor Bob got
there, no doubt plenty of chaps would hide him when he offered 'em
money enough to make it worth while. Once aboard one of those
sloops, he'd be about as safe as he would be anywhere. They'd land
him at St. Malo, or somewhere down there, and he'd give you the
slip."

"And, until it was found out that he was mad, we might hear no more
about him."

"Why should it be found that he was mad?" asked Bendigo. "He was
mad when he killed this innocent man, no doubt, because none but a
lunatic would have done such an awful thing, or been so cunning
after--with the sort of childish cunning that gave him away from
the start. But once he'd done what this twist in his brain drove
him to do, then I judge that his madness very likely left him. If
you caught him to-morrow, you'd possibly find him as sane as
yourself--except on that one subject. He'd worked up his old
hatred of Michael Pendean, as a shirker in the war, until it
festered in his head and poisoned his mind, so as he couldn't get
it under. That's how I read it. I had a pretty good contempt for
the poor chap myself and was properly savage with my niece, when
she wedded him against our wishes; but my feeling didn't turn my
head, and I felt glad to hear that Pendean was an honest man, who
did the best he could at the Moss Depot."

Brendon considered.

"A very sound view," he said, "and likely to be correct. On the
str