“I was thrown off the cliff; I don’t know whether the water partially restored me to consciousness, or whether I struggled; but the first distinct recollection I had was of being on the beach with the doctor. What he did for me I don’t know, but I was as well as ever in half an hour, with the exception of a terrible pain in my head, caused by the blow I had received. I did not get over it for a month. Dr. Bilks----” “Dr. Lynch is his real name,” interposed Dick. “Dr. Lynch, then, explained what he wanted of me. He had sent for me, and offered me a thousand dollars if I would publicly marry Miss Kingman. I intended to claim my wife again, but I wanted the money. I had always been short of funds. He wished me to marry her to prevent Mr. Hungerford from doing so. If I spoke of any doubts in regard to the legality of the marriage in Providence, it was only to get the money offered to me.” “What did the doctor say he wanted of you?” asked Dick, when Buckstone exhibited a tendency to enlarge upon his own excuses. “He laid out the plan just as he has carried it out. It would appear on the following day that I had been murdered by Ross Kingman. This was what he wanted, he said; he wished Mr. Hungerford to marry Mary then, if I would do as he wished me to do. He proposed to give me three thousand dollars a year for six years if I would assist. The offer blinded my eyes, and----” “You accepted it.” “I did; and he stipulated that I should leave the town before morning, and remain in some foreign land until he needed my attendance. Mary would apparently be a widow. I told him how to procure the evidence of our marriage, and gave him a letter to Dorning. Hungerford would make her his wife, and live in perfect confidence with her until the time when the three millions would come to him by the conditions of his uncle’s will. Dr. Bilks, or Dr. Lynch, explained the whole matter to me. At the right time I was to appear, claim Mary as my wife, and thus prove that the child was illegitimate, if there was one. “I had been wishing for years to go to Italy to study art. The means were now within my hand, and the doctor promised to remit the three thousand dollars to me every year. He has done so faithfully and punctually; though I hoped he would fail, for I was disgusted with the business.” “What did you do while on the beach? We found a body at the bottom of the channel which was identified as yours.”