documents. Is not that some guarantee?"

His lordship considered, and nodded slowly. "I admit that it is.
Yet I do not see how this publicity is to be avoided in the course
of the further investigations into the manner in which Count
Samoval came by his death."

"My lord, that is the pivot of the whole matter. All further
investigation must be suspended."

Sir Terence trembled, and his eyes turned in eager anxiety upon
the inscrutable, stern face of Lord Wellington.

"Must!" cried his lordship sharply.

"What else, my lord, in all our interests?" exclaimed the Secretary,
and he rose in his agitation.

"And what of British justice, sir?" demanded his lordship in a
forbidding tone.

"British justice has reason to consider itself satisfied. British
justice may assume that Count Samoval met his death in the pursuit
of his treachery. He was a spy caught in the act, and there and
then destroyed - a very proper fate. Had he been taken, British
justice would have demanded no less. It has been anticipated.
Cannot British justice, for the sake of British interests as well
as Portuguese interests, be content to leave the matter there?"

"An argument of expediency, eh?" said Wellington. "Why not, my