This would be followed invariably by a query in chorus of "who killed
him then?"

"Aha," Felix would retort, putting his head on one side, like a
meditative sparrow; "'tective fellers can't find out; that's the
difficulty. Good mind to go on the prowl myself, by Jove."

"But do you know anything of the detective business?" some one would
ask.

"Oh, dear yes," with an airy wave of his hand; "I've read Gaboreau, you
know; awfully jolly life, 'tectives."

Despite this evasion, Rolleston, in his heart of hearts, believed
Fitzgerald guilty. But he was one of those persons, who having either
tender hearts or obstinate natures--the latter is perhaps the more
general--deem it incumbent upon them to come forward in championship
of those in trouble. There are, doubtless, those who think that
Nero was a pleasant young man, whose cruelties were but the resultant
of an overflow of high spirits; and who regard Henry VIII. in the light
of a henpecked husband unfortunate in the possession of six wives.
These people delight in expressing their sympathy with great scoundrels
of the Ned Kelly order. They view them as the embodiment of heroism,
unsympathetically and disgracefully treated by the narrow understanding
of the law. If one half the world does kick a man when he is down, the
other half invariably consoles the prostrate individual with halfpence.

And therefore, even while the weight of public opinion was dead against
Fitzgerald he had his share of avowed sympathy. There was a comfort in
this for Madge. Not that if the whole countryside had unanimously