One mystery was unravelled, in the closer search made after his succession among the Squire's papers. In a secret receptacle was discovered a collection of letters which proved incontestably that Lawrence Trevenna was his natural son, born two years before his marriage to the mother of Lance Trevanion. The girl's father was a disreputable horse-and-turf-tout and betting man in a small way in a distant county; the girl herself the worthy offspring of such a father--handsome, bold, unprincipled. The Squire discovered that a deliberate plot had been laid for him. Hence his previous inexplicable hatred to all and every form of horse-racing and the gambling therewith concomitant. Attempts at blackmail were referred to as having been resisted by legal advice, but finally compromised by the payment of a comparatively large sum--only a part of which had helped to provide passage-money and outfit for Lawrence Trevenna. Some fragmentary addenda to the faded writing and curiously worded letters told of deep and bitter regret--even of repentance. But the sin had been sinned. The guilt lightly incurred in the riot of youthful passion had grown dark and menacing of aspect with the slow gathering years. And 'the vengeance due of all our wrongs' had haltingly, but with sleuth-hound deadliness, tracked down his happiness and shortened the wrongdoer's life. But for the fatal resemblance, the mysterious heritage of unbridled passion bequeathed to the Ishmaelite offspring, the heir of his ancient house had doubtless escaped injustice, imprisonment, and death. And now, 'Conrad, Lara, Ezzelia are gone.' A youthful scion--fair, blue-eyed, mirthful--makes merry in the old halls of his race. But of the wandering heir--he who defiantly quitted home, and friends, and native land in search of gold; who vowed to conquer fortune with the aid of the strong arm and tameless heart; to return successful, rich, honoured of all men; to claim his bride in his own ancient hall--of him the oaks in the Druids' Grove of Wychwood murmur to the midnight stars, 'Nevermore.' THE END POPULAR NOVELS BY THE SAME AUTHOR. _ROBBERY UNDER ARMS._ A STORY OF LIFE AND ADVENTURE IN THE BUSH AND IN THE GOLD-FIELDS OF AUSTRALIA. _GUARDIAN_--"A singularly spirited and stirring tale of Australian life, chiefly in the remoter settlements.... Altogether it is a capital story, full of wild adventure and startling incidents, and told with a genuine simplicity and quiet appearance of truth, as if the writer were really drawing upon his memory rather than his imagination." _SPECTATOR_--"We have nothing but praise for this story. Of adventure of the most stirring kind there is, as we have said, abundance. But there is more than this. The characters are drawn with great skill. Every one of the gang of bushrangers is strongly individualised. A book of no common literary force." _THE MINER'S RIGHT._ A TALE OF THE AUSTRALIAN GOLD-FIELDS.