Cleek: the Man of the Forty Faces

r a note to say that he had received a communication of such vital importance that he had been obliged to

ninteresting person I never encountered. Fancy! he never even offered to assist the gentlemen to

medicine that has simply worked wonders. Of course, he will have to stop in bed and be perfectly quiet for three or four days; but

hat there was a hunted look in her eyes, and that, as the day wore on, these things seemed to be accentuated. More than that, there seemed added proof of the truth of young Bawdrey's assertion that she and Captain

le that she devoted most of her time to whispered confidences with Captain Travers, that they kept going to the window and looking up at the sky, as if worried and annoyed that the twilight should be so long in

diately behind that in which the elder Mr. Bawdrey's collection was housed, and from which a broad French window opened out upon the gr

om to where he stood, a dimly seen figure in the dim light. "God help and pity me! but I am so nervous, I hardly know how to co

arkness; then a figure lifted itself above the screening shrubs just

erical cry and reached

t died when I read your note. To think that it is murder-murder! And but for you he might be dead even now. You wil

y to this, Captain Travers stalked

! And to think that all the time it wasn't some mysterious natural affliction;

variously called in th

on-Upas, Antjar, and Ipo

the Malays use in pois

ro

gony of entreaty. "Who?" she implored. "Who in this house could? You said you would tell to-night-you said you would. Oh, who could have the heart? Ah! Who? It is true, if you hav

had confessed; but I am waiting for a sign, and, until that comes, absolute proof is not possible. That it

e house. He stood, bent forward, listening, absolutely breathless; then, on the other side of the wall, there rippled and r

irled it open, scudded round the angle of the passage to the entrance of the room where the fraudulent collection was kept, and went in with the silent fle

writhing figure of a man, who bit and tore and snarled like a cornered wolf and fought with teeth and feet and hands alike in the wild effort to get free from the grip of destiny. A locked handcuff clamped one wrist, and from it swung, at the end

r handcuff into place. "You beast of ingratitude-you Judas! Kissing and betraying like any other Iscariot! And a dear

ng down, saw that the figure he was bendi

over her eyes and fell away weak and shivering. "Oh, Mr

ne the way he planned. You look in your boxes; you, too, Captain Travers. I'll wager each of you finds a phial of Ayupee hidden among them somewhe

whacks the bracelet on him. But he was too quick for me, sir, so I only got one on; and then, the hound, he turns on me like a blessed hyena, sir, and begins a-chawin' of me

you could lead me by the nose, and push me into finding those phials just where you wanted them found, didn't you? Well, you've got a few more thoughts coming. Look here, Captain Traver

as for his stepmother-why, she threw the little worm over as soon as he began making love to her,

poison-sap of the upas-tree is the base of it-producing first an irritation of the skin, then a blister, and, when that broke, communicating the poison directly to the blood every time the skeleton hand touched it. A weak solution at first, so that the decline would be natural, the growth of the malady gradual. But if I'd found that phial in your room last night, as he hoped and believe

leek? Why, h

sed, it is one of the most powerful agents for the relief, and, in some cases, the cure, of Bright's disease of the kidneys. But the Government guards this unholy drug most carefully. You can't get a drop of it in Java for love or money, unless on the order of a recognized physician; and you can't bring it into the ports of England unle

t h

a gesture of unspeakable contempt. "And all for the sake of an old man's money! If I did my duty, I'd gaol you. But if I did, it would be punishing the innocent for the crimes of the guilty. It would kill that dear old man to learn this; and so he's not going to learn it, and the law's not going to get its own." He twitched out his hand, and something tinkled on the floor. "Get up!" he said sharply. "There's the key of the handcuffs; ta

Gov'

s packed

' in the arbour, sir, as

-and swung out into the darkness and the moist, warm fragrance of the night; his mental poise a bit unsteady, his nerves raw. It was