"Now," proceeded the Member of Parliament, "tempting as those terms were, I refused them. For one thing, I knew my man, and I knew he was but a pinchbeck, unstable, untruthful kind of genius. For another, I realised that, as Foreign Secretary, he was a terrible danger to England, so I stuck to the line I had marked out for myself, without any thought or hope of my own advancement. `You've got to resign,' I returned--`nothing else will satisfy me or save you from the ridicule I have arranged to pour upon you. I have prepared a careful account of the whole business as we know it from the inside, ay, even of the way you must have helped Fotheringay to send those sham nurses, and to-morrow I shall telegraph it to every newspaper of importance. I will swear an affidavit of its truth, and join the opposition, and between us we will contrive to literally _laugh_ you out of power.' A terrible scene, of course, followed. He grew abusive, he tried more bribes, he threatened to have me flung into prison like yourselves--there wasn't, in fact, a trick or a dodge which a man in his powerful position could resort to that he didn't in turn practise on me. "Luckily, I am pretty obstinate," he went on, "and I won, hands down. Straight away he got two or three doctor friends together, and they cooked up a certificate about the state of his health; he rushed off to Buckingham Palace and handed over his resignation to the king, who, fortunately, happened to be in town; and, after various audiences, the Premier about an hour ago appointed the Marquis of Penarth in his place. In the Cabinet it is pretty well known how I managed it, but nobody regrets Cuthbertson's downfall. He was too proud, too overbearing, too insolent for the position, and all the members of the House whom I have spoken to seem to be relieved at his resignation and hurried departure to that old castle of his up in Galloway." "And what," asked Jose, "has become of my father and brother?" And his face was pale and his eyes full of tears. "I am sorry to say they have both bolted. The Home Secretary sent after them regarding the loss of certain plans from the Woolwich Arsenal, but they took fright over the forgeries and Cuthbertson's threats and slipped off to Greenwich, from which they got a tramp steamer to take them to some foreign port, whence they can flee up country and gain a quasi kind of protection, which it won't pay England to fight--probably in Portugal or Spain, or even in Greece, with which country, I understand, we have no extradition treaty whatever." "And you, colonel," I asked, turning to Napier. "How did you come to forgive us?" I queried. The old soldier broke into a hearty laugh. "Oh! that wasn't difficult when such a magician as Cooper-Nassington set to work. He told me the whole of the facts, whereas Fotheringay had only explained to me half!"