He turned back to the table with something of suppressed eagerness in his movements, and a low murmur of excitement went up round the crowded court room. Rapidly he tore off the wrappings from the long, snake-like bundle, and held one of the objects up to view. "Allow me to draw your attention to this," he said, in a loud, clear voice, every note of which carried to the back of the long room. "This, as you possibly know, sir, is a piece of electric tubing made for the express purpose of conveying safely delicate electric wirings that are used for installations, so that they may not be damaged in transit from the factory to--the agent who sells them. You would like to see the wirings, I know--" For answer he whipped open the joints of one of the tubes, set it upon end, and--from inside the narrow casing came a perfect shower of golden sovereigns clattering to the floor and across the table in front of the astonished clerk's eyes. The judge sat up suddenly and rubbed his eyes. "God bless my soul!" he began, and then subsided into silence. The eyes of young Sir Nigel Merriton nearly leapt from their sockets with astonishment; and every man in the crowd was gaping. Cleek laughed. "Rather of a surprise, I must admit; isn't it?" he said, with a slight shrug of the shoulders. "And no doubt you're wondering what all this has to do with the case in hand. Well, that'll come along all in good time. Golden sovereigns, you see, carefully stacked up to fill the little tubing to its capacity--and thousands of 'em done the same, too! There's a perfect fortune down there in that factory at Saltfleet! Mr. Narkom," he turned round and surveyed the Superintendent with mirthful eyes, "what about these bank robberies now, eh? I told you something would crop up. You see it has. We've discovered the hiding-place of the gold--and the prime leader in the whole distressing affair. The rest ought to be easy." He whipped round suddenly toward the line of witnesses, letting his eyes travel over each face in turn; past Tony West's reddened countenance, past Dr. Bartholomew's pale intensity, past Borkins, standing very straight and white and frightened-looking. Then, of a sudden he leapt forward, his hand clamped down upon someone's shoulder, and his voice exclaimed triumphantly: "And here the beauty is!" Then, before the astonished eyes of the crowd of spectators stood Mr. Gustave Brellier, writhing and twisting in the clutch of the firm fingers and spitting forth fury in a Flemish patois that would have struck Cleek dead on the spot--if words could kill. A sudden din arose. People pressed forward, the better to see and hear, exclaiming loudly, condemning, criticising. The judge's frail old hand brought silence at last, and Antoinette Brellier came forward from her place and clutched Cleek by the arm. "It cannot be, Mr.--Cleek!" she said piteously. "I tell you my uncle is the best of men, truly! He could never have done this thing that you accuse him of--and--"