h than I
am. I know you, and all about you, Cyprienne Vergette--otherwise Gascoigne,
otherwise Wilders.

"Shall I tell you a little of your early history? How you eloped from
Gibraltar, where your father was Vice-Consul; how you came to Paris
with your lover; your marriage, your life, your desertion of your
husband, your association with Ledantec, your second marriage, your
plots against Milord Essendine and his family, your murder--"

"It is a lie!" she interrupted him, hastily. "I never committed
murder."

"You compassed Lord Lydstone's death, although you did not strike the
blow. You would have caused the death of another English officer, but,
happily, he has escaped your murderous intrigues."

Only that morning the French journals had copied from the English an
account of McKay's almost providential escape on the 18th of June.

"But your last attempt has failed utterly. Mr.--" he referred to
his papers for the name--"McKay is safe within the British lines. The
agent you employed to inveigle him into danger is dead, but with his
last breath he confessed that he had had his orders from you. Now,
Cyprienne Vergette, what have you to say?"

"I deny everything. I protest against your jurisdiction."

"The Assize Court will hear, but scarcely admit, your plea. That
tribunal and its president will deal you as you deserve."

CHAPTER XV.

L'ENVOI.

The _Burlington Castle_ made a short halt at Constantinople, and
another, somewhat longer, at Malta; a third was to be made at
Gibraltar, where two of our most important characters proposed to
leave the ship.

The delay at Malta was to allow Miss Hidalgo to make her appearance in
the Supreme Court as principal witness against the baker, Giuseppe
Pisani, commonly called Valetta Joe.

The British military authorities in the Crimea had hesitated to deal
summarily with the spy's offence. He might have been hanged out of
hand under the Mutiny Act; but such swift retribution, however richly
merited, was obnoxious to our general's sense of justice.

He preferred to leave the criminal to the ordinary tribunals of his
native island. It could adjudge and carry out any punishment short of
death, if so inclined. In the Crimea the capital sentence only would
have been possible.

The trial was short and summary. Mariquita, dressed still in the
sober, quaker-like garb of a hospital-nurse, said what she had to say
in a few simple words. Her sweet face and artless manner