“Where is Captain Bradshaw?” was Alice Heathcote’s first question, as, escorted by Mr. Walker and the footman, she entered the house. “In the dining-room, Miss Heathcote.” Alice entered, followed by Mr. Walker. “Oh, uncle,” she said, passionately, “we have been so cruel and so wrong. It has been such a terrible mistake after all, and poor Frank is quite, quite innocent. Oh, uncle, I’m so happy, so, so glad.” And she threw her arms round Captain Bradshaw’s neck. Her uncle was too much surprised to speak at first. “Innocent, my dear!” “Yes, uncle, quite, quite innocent. Here is Mr. Walker to tell you.” “Sit down, Mr. Walker,” Captain Bradshaw said, rather stiffly, for he believed that the present was some scheme on the part of the old man to prove that Carry had not gone wrong at all. “Let me hear what you have to say. I can hardly understand, I confess, how my nephew can be innocent in this matter; although I have heard to-day, and with pleasure, that your daughter was still alive.” “Well, sir,” Mr. Walker began, in his usual nervous hesitating way, “it seems it was a mistake altogether. I thought of your nephew—I knew him to be your nephew—and I did not know the other was your nephew at all. So you see you thought I meant the wrong one—that was how it was.” Captain Bradshaw looked at Alice in bewilderment. “Damme, Alice, if I can make head or tail of what he says, or what he means.” “He means this, uncle. He knew you had a nephew, but he only knew you had one nephew. He came to accuse that nephew as the destroyer of his child. That man whom he accused was not the nephew you were thinking of. It was Fred Bingham who had done this thing, and not Frank Maynard. Frank never went there again after that evening when he spoke to you. They never knew he was in any way related to you. It was Fred Bingham he spoke of. He was the man Mr. Walker knew to be your nephew, and who had ruined his daughter.” Captain Bradshaw sat thunderstruck. He looked helplessly at Stephen Walker, who corroborated what Alice had said by putting in,— “Yes, sir, that is what I meant to say. When I came to you, I came to ask for vengeance against the Mr. Bingham I knew to be your nephew. I never thought of Mr. Maynard; I did not know he was your relation at all; I only knew him as the man who had saved my life.” Captain Bradshaw listened as a man in a dream, then leaping on his feet with his quick, hasty way, he exclaimed,— “Then Frank never had anything to do with it at all?” “Nothing, uncle, nothing at all.” “He is quite innocent?” “Quite, uncle—as innocent as we are.”