rose from them as the old lawyer spread them out on the desk.

"Which Countess of Ellingham, and which Lord Marketstoke?" asked Viner.
"There have been--must have been--several during the last century."

"The Lord Marketstoke I mean is the one who disappeared," answered Mr.
Pawle. "We've no concern with any other. Look at these dates! We know
that if he were living, he would now be a man of sixty-one or so;
therefore, he'd be at school about forty-five years ago. Now, look here,"
he went on, rapidly turning the letters over. "Compare these dates--they
run through two or three years; they were all of forty-three to forty-six
years since. You see how they're signed--you see how they're addressed?
There's no doubt about it, Viner--this is a collection of letters written
by the seventh Countess of Ellingham to her elder son, Lord Marketstoke,
when he was at Eton."

"How came they into Ashton's possession, I wonder!" asked Viner.

"It's all of a piece!" exclaimed Mr. Pawle. "All of a piece with
Ashton's visit to Marketstoke--all of a piece with the facts that Avice
was a favourite name with the Cave-Gray family, and that one of the
holders of the title married a Wickham. Viner, there's no doubt
whatever--in my mind--that either Ashton was Lord Marketstoke or that he
knew the man who was!"

"You remember what Armitstead told us," remarked Viner. "That Ashton told
him, in Paris, that he, Ashton, hailed from Lancashire?"

"Then--he knew the missing man, and got these papers from him!" declared
the old lawyer. "But why? Ah!--now I have an idea! It may be that