"Well," she continued in a low voice, almost as though she were speaking to herself, "three days later I called at Albert Gate, saw my uncle alone, and handed him the little box, which he seemed much surprised at receiving, and which he took into an adjoining room and opened. When he returned to me he was greatly excited, and asked me if I was aware what the box contained. I told him that they were a set of liqueur glasses. He smiled. Then he asked me who gave it to me, and I told him a young gentleman whom I knew slightly, and that if there was any reply I would hand it to him myself. `You shall have the reply for him to-morrow, Sybil,' was the old man's answer. `I can only say that you've brought me the most valuable present that I've ever received in all my life.' My curiosity was at once aroused, and I asked to see the glasses, but he refused, saying that they did not concern me. Two days later I returned, and he handed me a sealed letter addressed to `Ralph Vickers, Esquire,' and--" "Vickers!" I gasped. "The sleek-haired fellow who was arrested this morning?" "The same," she answered hoarsely. "He was the man who met me in Paris, and into whose unscrupulous hands and those of his associates I so innocently fell. A few days after receiving the note from the Admiral, Vickers was, I found, in London, and late one evening I slipped out of the house to the corner of Berkeley Square, and there delivered the Admiral's reply into his hands. He remained in England, but somehow-- why I really can't tell--I began to suspect that his mode of life was not altogether honest. Perhaps it was because one day the Admiral, who came to stay with us at Ryhall, was very inquisitive about him, and added that he sincerely hoped I had broken off the acquaintanceship. At any rate, although I sometimes met him I no longer entertained any affection for him. My girlish idol was, indeed, broken sadly when just as I made my _debut_ in society he began to write letters compelling me to meet him, and commenced to seek information from me concerning the habits and movements of certain people whom I met in our set in London. Well," she sighed, "this went on for about a year. I hated him now, for I had detected how false he was. Yet moving with Cynthia in the gay set I saw that I could never afford to allow the fellow to disclose those foolish letters I had written to him. At this juncture, while I was staying up in Durham, came a note which placed Ralph Vickers in his true light--that of a blackguard. In guarded language he explained that he had, previous to making my acquaintance, done three years in prison, and that as he was now without funds I must obtain money for him--indeed, pay him in order to keep the secret of those letters--the secret that I had loved a gaol-bird! In reply, however, I openly defied him. In response he came up to Durham, and I was compelled to meet him in secret. The object of his visit was truly a brutal one.