already risen, and was holding Parson Christian's hand with a
nervous grip. She stepped apart, and going behind the two men, she came
to a stand between them. On the one side stood Drayton, with a smirking
face half turned toward the spectators; on the other stood the convict,
his hands bound before him, his defiant glance softened to a look of
tenderness, and his lips parted with the unuttered cry that was ready to
burst from them.

"Greta," said Hugh Ritson, in a low tone of indescribable pathos, "which
of these men is your husband?"

Counsel repeated the question in form.

Greta had slowly raised her eyes from the ground until they reached the
convict's face. Then in an instant, in a flash of light, with the quick
cry of a startled bird, she flung herself on his neck. Her fair head
dropped on the frieze of the convict's jacket, and her sobs were all
that broke the silence.

Hugh Ritson's emotion surged in his throat, but he stood quietly at the
table. Only his slight figure swayed a little and his face quivered. His
work was not yet done.

"This is the answer of nature," he said quietly.

Hugh Ritson was put into the witness-box, and in a voice that was full
and strong, and that penetrated every corner of the court, he identified
the convict as his brother, Paul Ritson.

Counsel for the defense had seemed to be stunned. Recovering himself, he
tried to smile, and said:

"After this melodramatic interlude, perhaps I may be allowed to ask our
new witness a few questions. Did you, at the Central Criminal Court,
held at the Old Bailey in 1875, swear that the person who stands here in
the dress of a convict was not Paul Ritson?"

"I did."

"Now for my second question. Did you also swear that the defendant was
your brother, and therefore not Paul Drayton."

"I did."

"Then you were guilty of perjury at that time, or you are guilty of
perjury now?"

"I was guilty of perjury then."

The judge interposed and asked if the witness was awakened to the
enormity of the crime to which he confessed. Hugh Ritson bent his head.

"Are you conscious that you are rendering yourself liable to penal
servitude?"

"I have signed a declaration of my guilt."

The answers were given in perfect calmness, but a vein of pathos ran
through every word.

"Do you know that a few years back many a poor wretch whose crime was
trifling compared with yours has gone from the dock to the gallows?"

"My guilt is unmitigated guilt. I