Clare watched her uncle with astonishment as he rose from his chair and planted himself upon the hearth-rug before the fireplace, now adorned with its summer ornaments of plants and flowers, and draped in muslin. Taking up the familiar British attitude, and looking, if possible, more than ever pompous, Mr. Carruthers proceeded: "You will be surprised to learn, Clare, that the visit of the gentleman who came here yesterday, and with whom I went out, had reference to this murder." "How, uncle?" exclaimed Clare. "What on earth have you, or has any one here, to do with it?" "Wait until I have done, and you will see," said Mr. Carruthers in a tone of stately rebuke. "The last person seen in the company of the man afterwards found murdered, and who dined with him at the tavern, wore a coat which the waiter who recognized the body had chanced to notice particularly. The appearance of this person the man failed in describing with much distinctness; but he was quite positive about the coat, which he had taken from the man and hung up on a peg with his own hands. And now, Clare, I am coming to the strangest part of this strange story." The girl listened with interest indeed, and with attention, but still wondering how her uncle could be involved in the matter, and perhaps feeling a little impatient at the slowness with which, in his self-importance, he told the story. "I was much surprised," continued Mr. Carruthers, "to find in the gentleman who came here yesterday, and whose name was Dalrymple, an emissary from the Home Office, intrusted by Lord Wolstenholme with a special mission to me"--impossible to describe the pomposity of Mr. Carruthers's expression and utterance at this point--"to me. He came to request me to assist him in investigating this most intricate and important case. It is not a mere police case, you must understand, my dear. The probability is that the murdered man is a political refugee, and that the crime has been perpetrated"--Mr. Carruthers brought out the word with indescribable relish--"by a member of one of the secret societies, in revenge for the defection of the victim, or in apprehension of his betrayal of the cause." "What cause, uncle?" asked Clare innocently. She was not of a sensational turn of mind, had no fancy for horrors as horrors, and was getting a little tired of her uncle's story.