"The fact is, my dear sir," he answered, "for the first fortnight or three weeks after you had fancied me drowned, I was not at all aware of such a report. I was first detained at a cottage with a dislocated ancle, and next ill of a fever at Hartford Bridge; and at the time I learned the rumour of my own death, I was under the absolute necessity of going to Paris, in order to pursue the miscreants who committed the horrid murder of which you have heard, at Ryebury. As I was the only person who could prove the facts against them, or lead to their apprehension, the rumour of my death I knew would throw them off their guard; and therefore it was necessary to leave it uncontradicted. Besides"---- "But surely," interrupted Lord Ashborough, who, though strongly inclined to enquire farther concerning the murderers, was resolved to press Beauchamp home in the first instance. "But surely you could have trusted to my discretion in the business. "Undoubtedly, my lord!" replied Beauchamp; "and I need not tell you that, under any ordinary circumstances, you would have been the very first person to whom I should have communicated my situation, and whom I should have consulted in what I was undertaking." Lord Ashborough bowed his head with a placable smile, and Beauchamp continued:--"But I could only have done so by writing to you, or by coming to see you. The latter, of course, was out of the question; for I was not willing to trust my secret to your host of servants, and to write was equally impossible, as there were circumstances to explain which could only be done personally." "How so? Why so?" demanded the earl. "That is what I was about to explain," answered Beauchamp. "The fact is, that the man of all others whose greatest interest it was to foil me in endeavouring to bring the murderers to justice--with the exception, of course, of the murderers themselves--is your confidential man of business and lawyer, Mr. Peter Tims." Lord Ashborough started; for though this carried him back again to the subject of the murderers, it was not exactly in the way he best liked. "You are mistaken, Henry," he said; "quite mistaken! No man has been more anxious in thought, or more strenuous in exertion, than Mr. Tims, to bring the murderers of his uncle to justice--You forget their near relationship, and he is a great deal too--too--too"---- Lord Ashborough would fain have added "Too honest a man!" but the words stuck in his throat, and, as he paused, Beauchamp finished the sentence for him--"Too great a rogue, my lord, he most certainly is, ever to think of relationship where interest is concerned. I found that out some time ago, ere I took the step of removing my affairs from his hands, to those of Messrs. Steelyard and Wilkinson."