'Oh, I'm bonnie Prince Charlie too.' 'That only indicates that you are mad; and a very ordinary madness it is. I am sure there are two or three bonnie Prince Charlies in every lunatic asylum in Scotland.' 'I'm mad, an' naebody daur harm me,' growled Clacher. 'You remember Robert's escapade when he was a boy, Henry?' said Miss Jane. 'To which do you refer? There were so many,' said Lee. 'Oh, not so very many,' said Miss Jane. 'I mean the Inverkip Glen affair.' 'I can't say I do remember it.' 'Oh, you must. You weren't here at the time; but you knew all about it.' Lee sat up, and swiftly changed his look of anxiety into a far-reaching glance at the past. 'Ah, yes!' he said, dropping back in his chair again. 'Clacher must have heard about it,' said Miss Jane. 'I shouldn't wonder,' said Lee. 'Clacher, do you know about the Inverkip Glen affair?' 'Of course. I'm Robert Chartres. I'm Clacher too, and Bonnie Prince Charlie. I don't know how.' 'Then,' said Lee, 'just tell us about it. Your acquaintance with it may be evidence of your identity.' 'The Inverkip Glen business?' said Clacher. 'A'body kens that. Damn!' he growled at the Scotch. 'Let us see, now,' said Lee. 'Have you any details that could only be known to Robert and his family?' 'Inverkip Glen,' said Clacher. 'When I was fourteen or thereabouts, I went away wi' a wheen laddies an' hid in it for twa-three days. I ca'ed mysel' Prince Charlie, an' the ithers wis cheeftans--Lochiel an' Glengarry, ye ken. We fought the servants that wis sent tae bring us hame, an' they had tae send the polis tae fetch us.' This was spoken very haltingly, and ended with a savage oath at his own inability to speak correctly. 'He could have learned all that in the village,' said Miss Jane. Lee rose, leant gracefully against the mantelpiece, and addressed Clacher. 'Clacher,' he said, 'you have unwittingly undertaken a work of art, and for that you deserve high commendation. You have aspired; you have done your best. That is sufficient. Success is the only failure. A compassable aim is an inferior one. Ideals cease to be when realised. Better succeed in a constant endeavour after the highest, than fail in aspiration to achieve a result as splendid as any which history records. These platitudes are not by any means beside the question, although you don't understand them.' Here Lee shifted from his easy pose, and stood firmly on his feet. 'Whatever besides madness,' he continued, 'may have led you to attempt this imposture, is no concern of mine. I am only sorry for your sake and my own that you cannot continue it further. Variety, if not the soul, is certainly the body of fiction. I hope that, although you must go out of our story shortly, at least in your present capacity, you, or some one else in your sphere of life, may be enmeshed in this web of circumstance which I help fate to weave. My brother Robert is at present upstairs. He arrived here this evening.'