Among the papers which had come into the hands of Miss Bellamy at the death of Ambrose Murray's wife, were certain verbatim accounts of the trial for the Tewkesbury murder. These papers Miss Bellamy had carefully preserved, and they were now handed over by her to Gerald, who proceeded to read them carefully through three or four times, by which means he made himself master of all the details of the case as they had presented themselves at the trial. A certain Mr. Frodsham had been Murray's counsel on that occasion, and very admirable had been the speech, and very cogent the arguments, employed by him in his attempt to prove the innocence of his client--an attempt which, as we have already seen, did not succeed. To Gerald, turning the whole case over in his mind, it seemed that the first thing to do was to find out this Mr. Frodsham, see him, consult with him, tell him in confidence of Murray's escape, and ascertain whether, after so long a time, his experience could suggest any feasible plan for proving, or even attempting to prove, the innocence of a client for whose sake, twenty years ago, all his eloquence had been exerted in vain. In setting about the task which he had thus taken in hand, and which he was thoroughly determined to go through with, Gerald did not expect to derive much assistance from Murray himself, nor, in fact, did he. Murray was altogether too unpractical; he had been shut up too long from the busy, struggling world around him to enable him to cope with it face to face, or to grope his way through such a blind man's maze as his own case necessarily involved, at every step of which a knot would have to be disentangled, or a difficulty of some kind encountered and overcome. He could asseverate earnestly enough that Jacoby was the murderer, and that the sole object for which he now lived was to bring the crime home to him; but when asked by what means that was to be done, he was like a child who had lost itself in some dark place. He could only cling to Gerald, and ask him to think, to devise, to scheme for him. "I have faith--faith the most intense," he would sometimes say, "that the world will know me for what I am before I die. Why else was my reason given back to me? why else was a way of escape shown me? why else am I here, except to prove this thing? And, oh, Gerald! why has an over-ruling Intelligence sent to me you, the son of my lost darling's oldest friend--you, with your kind heart, and clear brain, and knowledge of the world and its ways--except to assist me, to give to my forlorn weakness that strong helping hand, without which I can do nothing! Other men might ask: Why should I help this escaped lunatic? Why should I trouble myself about this criminal madman, on whose head the guilt of blood still rests? But not you--not you! You and I, Gerald, have been mysteriously drawn together by the bonds of an invisible sympathy. We have been brought together, not