"In heaven's name," I whispered, "what was the matter just now?
What had I said?"

"You mentioned the name of John Dwerrihouse."

"What of that? I had seen him not two hours before."

"It is a most astounding circumstance that you should have seen
him," said Captain Prendergast. "Are you sure it was he?"

"As sure as of my own identity. We were talking all the way between
London and Blackwater. But why does that surprise you?"

"_Because_" replied Captain Prendergast, dropping his voice
to the lowest whisper--"_because John Dwerrihouse absconded three
months ago with seventy-five thousand pounds of the company's money,
and has never been heard of since_."

John Dwerrihouse had absconded three months ago--and I had seen him
only a few hours back! John Dwerrihouse had embezzled seventy-five
thousand pounds of the company's money, yet told me that he carried
that sum upon his person! Were ever facts so strangely incongruous,
so difficult to reconcile? How should he have ventured again into
the light of day? How dared he show himself along the line? Above
all, what had he been doing throughout those mysterious three months
of disappearance?

Perplexing questions these--questions which at once suggested
themselves to the minds of all concerned, but which admitted of no