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“Yes! yes! yes!” came from each mouth.

“Then already you have your wish. I do not question one word of your charges against Lance. I have reason to believe them true. But I am not Lance. Lance lies at this moment dead at Great Glemham. He died this afternoon of cholera. Here are his letters,” and he laid the letters on the table. “I rode in with them at once. You do not believe me, but you can put my words to the test. Let one of you ride to Great Glemham and satisfy himself. He will be back before morning.”

The three officers listened so far with impassive faces, or barely listened, for they were as indifferent to the words as to the passion with which they were spoken.

“We have had enough of the gentleman’s ingenuities, I think,” said Chantrell, and he made a movement towards his companions.

“One moment,” exclaimed Mitchelbourne. “Answer me a question! These letters are to the address of Mrs. Ufford at a house called ‘The Porch.’ It is near to here?”

“It is the first house you passed,” answered the Major and, as he noticed a momentary satisfaction flicker upon his victim’s face, he added, “But you will not do well to expect help from ‘The Porch’–at all events in time to be of much service to you. You hardly appreciate that we have been at some pains to come up with you. We are not likely again to find so many circumstances agreeing to favour us, a dismantled house, yourself travelling alone and off your guard in a country with which you are unfamiliar and where none know you, and just outside the window a convenient pool. Besides–besides,” he broke out passionately, “There are the little mounds about Tangier, under which my friends lie,” and he covered his face with his hands. “My friends,” he cried in a hoarse and broken voice, “my soldier-men! Come, let’s make an end. Bassett, the rope is in the corner. There’s a noose to it. The beam across the window will serve;” and Bassett rose to obey.

But Mitchelbourne gave them no time. His fears had altogether vanished before his indignation at the stupidity of these officers. He was boiling with anger at the thought that he must lose his life in this futile ignominious way for the crime of another man, who was not even his friend, and who besides was already dead. There was just one chance to escape, it seemed to him. And even as Bassett stooped to lift the coil of rope in the corner he took it.

“So that’s the way of it,” he cried stepping forward. “I am to be hung up to a beam till I kick to death, am I? I am to be buried decently in that stagnant pool, am I? And you are to be miles away before sunrise, and no one the wiser! No, Major Chantrell, I am not come to the end of my lane,” and before either of the three could guess what he was at, he had snatched up the pistol from the table and dashed the lamp into a thousand fragments.

The flame shot up blue and high, and then came darkness.

Mitchelbourne jumped lightly back from his position to the centre of the room. The men he had to deal with were men who would follow their instincts. They would feel along the walls; of so much he could be certain. He heard the coil of rope drop down in a corner to his left; so that he knew where Captain Bassett was. He heard a chair upset in front of him, and a man staggered against his chest. Mitchelbourne had the pistol still in his hand and struck hard, and the man dropped with a crash. The fall followed so closely upon the upsetting of the chair that it seemed part of the same movement and accident. It seemed so clearly part, that a voice spoke on Mitchelbourne’s left, just where the empty hearth would be.