The newspapers of that morning had exaggerated nothing at all. And then the man was obviously closely intimate with Sir Thomas Ducaine. Sir Augustus made up his mind. "I am going to do a thing very much out of the ordinary," he said. "But this is not an ordinary occasion, however much some of us here would like it to be so. I am going to speak out, and I am going to ask some questions. I think you will admit that I have a right to ask them. My nephew by marriage, Lluellyn Lys, is dead. Lady Kirwan and I stand _in loco parentis_ to our dear niece here, Mary Lys. She is, of course, of age, and legally her own mistress. But there are moral obligations which are stronger than legal ones. Very well, then. Mary, my dear girl, I want you to tell me why you asked Sir Thomas Ducaine to come here this morning. And did you ask Mr. Joseph here to accompany him?" "I asked Sir Thomas to come, uncle," she said, "because I wanted to persuade him to meet Joseph. I wanted him to hear the truth as I have heard it. I wanted him to believe in Christ, and follow Him with us. I did not ask Joseph to come here. I did not know that he had ever met Sir Thomas." Then Ducaine broke in. "I think, Sir Augustus," he said, "that here I must make an explanation. Mary and I are old friends. We have known each other for a long time." He paused, with an evident difficulty in continuing, nor did he see the swift glance which passed between Lady Kirwan and her husband--a glance full of surprise, meaning, and satisfaction, which said as plainly as possible, "this quite alters the position of affairs!" Ducaine continued:-- "I hate speaking about it," he said, "but you have a right to know. I love her better than anything else in the world, and over and over again I have asked her to be my wife. She has always refused me. I have understood that such a great joy might be possible for me if I could believe as Mary believes. But I couldn't do so. I could not believe in Christ, and of course I could not pretend to accept Christianity in its full sense unless I was really convinced. It was no use trying to trick myself into a state of mind which my conscience would tell me was insincere. There the matter has rested until last night. Last night I was at the theatre, and saw Mary with Joseph. Afterwards, when I came out, I tried to find them everywhere, but they had vanished. I was in a terrible state of mind when I met, by chance, a friend of Joseph's--a Mr. Hampson--who came home to supper with me. Late that same evening I met, by a coincidence"--Joseph shook his head with a smile, but Ducaine did not notice him--"by a coincidence, I met Joseph. We have talked all night long, and I have come to this conclusion." He paused, and, in the sunlight, Mary could see that little beads of perspiration stood out upon his brow. There was a dead silence in the room now, every ear was strained--one heart, at least, was beating rapidly. "Yes?" Sir Augustus said.