plot, the mystery had thickened.

I now felt that there was only one way of fathoming the secret of the
crime. I also must get myself committed! Then I would be able to rejoin
the other actors in this strange drama, and learn their motives, and the
real facts of the case.

In a moment my resolution was taken.

Springing to my feet, I exclaimed in clarion tones:--

'My lord, I am an accessory after the fact.'

Sir Joshua Juggins gave a cry of despair. Then mastering himself, he
whispered:--

'Take that idiot away, and give him penal servitude for life.'

As I left the court in chains, I heard the next case being called.

CHAPTER XIII.--Cleared Up. (From The 'Green Park Gazette.')

THE legitimate public interest in the Nownham Mystery suggested to us
the propriety of sending one of our young men down to interview all
parties. After having visited the Maori King, Mrs. Weldon, several
Eminent Advertisers, and the crew of the _Mignonette_, he felt that his
present task was a light one. He had to see the murderer, William Evans;
the murderess, Mrs. South, or Lady Errand; the accessory after the fact,
Dr. South; the victim, Sir Runan Errand; and Mrs. Thompson, the owner of
the key on which the case for the prosecution hinged.

His adventures in the various Asylums where those unhappy persons are
unconfined have little public interest. We print the Confessions just
as our young man took them down in shorthand from the lips of the
sufferers.

_The Confession of_ Sir Runan Errand.

'I need not tell you that I never was even the husband of the woman
Phllippa at all. She stood in no relation to me, except as one of the
persons in the _troupe_ which I was foolish enough to manage. Instead of
visiting her in January last to settle her pecuniary claims against me,
I sent my valet. It appears that the man wore an old hat of mine,
which he lost in the storm. That was not the only article of property
belonging to me he carried off. I have since had a penitent letter from
him. He is doing well in the United States, and has been elected to the
Legislature. I have given up the freak of dabbling in the show business,
and merely keep a private theatre at such a distance from human abodes
that no one can complain of it as a nuisance. Since the disappearance of
my valet I have been travelling in my own yacht. I reached England the
day before the trial. 'No. I never read the newspapers. Thank goodness I
am no bookworm.'