llow serpent in
Maudelain's palm. "And yet five years ago," he mused, "this hair was
turned to dust. God keep us all!" Then he saw the tall lean emissary
puffed out like a candle-flame; and upon the floor he saw the huddled
cloak waver and spread like ink, and he saw the white parchment slowly
dwindle, as snow melts under the open sun. But in his hand remained
the lock of yellow hair.

"O my only friend," said Maudelain, "I may not comprehend, but I know
that by no unhallowed art have you won back to me." Hair by hair he
scattered upon the floor that which he held. "_Time is!_ and I have
not need of any token to spur my memory." He prized up a corner of the
hearthstone, took out a small leather bag, and that day purchased a
horse and a sword.

At dawn the Blessed Evrawc rode eastward in secular apparel. Two weeks
later he came to Sunninghill; and it happened that the same morning
the Earl of Salisbury, who had excellent reason to consider ...

_Follows a lacuna of fourteen pages. Maudelain's successful imposture
of his half-brother, Richard the Second, so strangely favored by their
physical resemblance, and the subsequent fiasco at Circencester, are
now, however, tolerably well known to students of history._

_In one way or another, Maudelain contrived to take the place of his
now dethroned brother, and therewith also the punishment designed for
Richard. It would seem evident, from the Argument of the story in
hand, that Nicolas de Caen attributes a large part of this mysterious
business to the co-operancy of Isabel of Valois, King Richard's eleven
year old wife. And (should one have a taste for the deductive) the
foregoing name of Orvendile, when compared with "THE STORY OF THE
SCABBARD," would certainly hint that Owain Glyndwyr had a finger in
the affair._

_It is impossible to divine by what method, according to Nicolas, this
Edward Maudelain was substituted for his younger brother. Nicolas, if
you are to believe his "EPILOGUE," had the best of reasons for knowing
that the prisoner locked up in Pontefract Castle in the February of
1400, after Harry of Derby had seized the crown of England, was not
Richard Plantagenet: as is attested, also, by the remaining fragment
of this same_ "STORY OF THE HERITAGE."

... and eight men-at-arms followed him.

Quickly Maudelain rose from the table, pushing his tall chair aside,
and as he did this, one of the soldiers closed the door securely.
"Nay, eat your fill, Sire Richa