CHAPTER XXVI.
A SENSATION "I can assure you that the situation was quite dramatic," continued the man in the corner, whilst his funny, claw-like hands took up a bit of string with renewed feverishness.
"In answer to further questions from the magistrate, she declared that she had never seen the accused; he might have been the go-between, however, that she could not say.

The letters she received were all typewritten, but signed 'Armand de la Tremouille,' and certainly the signature was identical with that on the letters she used to receive from him years ago, all of which she had kept.
"'And did it _never_ strike you,' asked the magistrate with a smile, 'that the letters you received might be forgeries ?' "'How could they be ?' she replied decisively; no one knew of my marriage to the Comte de la Tremouille, no one in England certainly.

And, besides, if some one did know the Comte intimately enough to forge his handwriting and to blackmail me, why should that some one have waited all these years?
I have been married seven years, your Honour.' "That was true enough, and there the matter rested as far as she was concerned.

But the identity of Mr.Francis Morton's assailant had to be finally established, of course, before the prisoner was committed for trial.

Dr.Mellish promised that Mr.Morton would be allowed to come to court for half an hour and identify the accused on the following day, and the case was adjourned until then.