"But I can tell a more interesting tale."
And he proceeded to relate the adventures of Cecil in the person of "the
Bishop," to which his Lordship listened with open-mouthed astonishment.

"There!" concluded his captor triumphantly. "Have you anything to say to
that?"

"I have," chimed in Miss Arminster, and she gave the true version of the
affair from the time Banborough had first engaged them at the Grand
Central Station.

"It's a very plausible story," said Marchmont, when she had finished,
"and does credit to your invention. But fortunately I'm in a condition
to completely disprove it."

"Really?" she asked. "How so?"

"I can produce a witness of the whole transaction."

"Who?"

"Friend Othniel."

"What! here, on board the yacht?"

"Yes," said Marchmont, "on board this yacht. And he can prove that what
I say is true."

"What? About the Bishop?" she cried, her voice quivering with suppressed
merriment.

"Certainly," replied the journalist. "After his release from the Black
Maria he tells substantially your story, but gives the Bishop the part
you have carefully assigned to his innocent son."

At this she once more broke into peals of laughter, but at last,
recovering her speech, managed to gasp out:

"Bring him here, and see what he says."

"I will," said Marchmont, hurriedly leaving the cabin, for her
marvellous self-possession was beginning to arouse unpleasant suspicions
even in his mind.

"But what does it all mean?" queried the Bishop helplessly, after the
journalist's departure. "How dare he say such things about me! I drive a
prison-van, indeed!"

"I'll tell you," she replied, striving to control her voice. "It's the
greatest practical joke that ever was. We called your son 'the Bishop,'
just as a nickname, you see, and of course the tramp heard us, and,
after we dropped him in Montreal, must have blown the whole thing to
Marchmont out of spite, and, not knowing any better, he thought your son
really _was_ the Bishop."

Here his Lordship became speechless, as the truth dawned upon him; and
at that moment Marchmont entered the cabin, with Friend Othniel in tow.

"There!" he said, pointing to the ecclesiastic. "Is that the Bishop of
Blanford?"

"Naw," replied the tramp. "He's old enough to be his father, he is. The
Bishop I means is a young 'un."

"Like this!" cried Violet, opening the locket which Cecil had given her
in Montreal, and handing it to the tramp.

"That's him to a T," s