"Yes. He hates you, and told me to see you and put the matter to you. You have a week to think over it, and at the end of that time, Mr. Brendon, if you don't leave England you will be arrested." "No," replied Brendon, calmly, "I will not be arrested. Setting aside the fact that there is no evidence which implicates me in the crime, Lord Derrington, for his own sake, will not have his grandson arrested and his dirty linen washed in public. Whether there was a marriage or not I am his flesh and blood. Why does he hate me?" "I can't say, sir. He never explained. But he does hate you." "Humph! I see no reason--a man can't help his birth, and I am quite as presentable as Walter Vane." "Much more so," said Bawdsey, quickly. "He is a fool and a miserable little beast. He sent a bracelet to Miss Velez." "Oh! and naturally you think the worst of him. Well, it is no use my conjecturing the reason of Lord Derrington's dislike. But I can well understand why Mrs. Ward wishes me out of the way. On what grounds does she accuse me of being concerned in this crime?" "On the strength of a story related by a friend of yours, who----" "I knew it," interrupted Brendon, starting up and beginning to pace the room. "That was why she asked Leonard Train to dinner." "That's the man," said Bawdsey, coolly. "He occupied these rooms, I believe, and on the night of the murder you stopped with him." "I did. In yonder bedroom. So he betrayed me?" "My dear sir, I don't think he could help himself. Mrs. Ward is as clever as the devil, and as unscrupulous. She got out of him that you had been in the sitting-room of Mrs. Jersey at midnight." "That is untrue----" began George, violently, when Bawdsey stopped him. "So it is, to Mrs. Ward, to Lord Derrington, and to the public. But so far as I am concerned, Mr. Brendon, it is a fact. You were in Mrs. Jersey's room about the time she was murdered." "How can you prove that?" asked George, quickly and very pale. "Oh, I can prove it easily enough, and I will soon. But confess." "That I killed the woman? No, I never laid a finger on her." "I believe that," said Bawdsey. "If I thought you were guilty I should--no--not even then. You saved my life, and I'm grateful." "I believe you are my friend," said George, gloomily, sitting down. "You would have been arrested by now were I not, Mr. Brendon." "No. I tell you neither Mrs. Ward nor Lord Derrington will go so far. They will try and intimidate me. But they won't succeed." "You'll fight them?" George set his face. "While there is breath in my body." "I knew you were a plucky 'un," said Bawdsey, admiringly, "but you must be aware that your position is perilous." "How so? Mr. Train can prove that he locked the sitting-room door--that one there," and George pointed. "The key was under his pillow, and in the morning the door was still fast. How could I have got out to visit Mrs. Jersey's room without his knowledge?"