At the moment when I crossed the threshold of the door, I heard Sergeant Cuff's voice, asking where I was. He met me, as I returned into the room, and forced me to go back with him to the bedside.

`Mr. Blake!' he said. `Look at the man's face. It is a face disguised--and here's a proof of it!'

He traced with his finger a thin line of livid white, running backward from the dead man's forehead, between the swarthy complexion and the slightly disturbed black hair. `Let's see what is under this,' said the Sergeant, suddenly seizing the black hair, with a firm grip of his hand.

My nerves were not strong enough to bear it. I turned away again from the bed.

The first sight that met my eyes, at the other end of the room, was the irrepressible Gooseberry, perched on a chair, and looking with breathless interest, over the heads of his elders, at the Sergeant's proceedings.

`He's pulling off his wig!' whispered Gooseberry, compassionating my position, as the only person in the room who could see nothing.

There was a pause--and then a cry of astonishment among the people round the bed.

`He's pulled off his beard!' cried Gooseberry.

There was another pause--Sergeant Cuff asked for something. The landlord went to the washhand- stand, and returned to the bed with a basin of water and a towel.

Gooseberry danced with excitement on the chair. `Come up here, along with me, sir! He's washing off his complexion now!'

The Sergeant suddenly burst his way through the people about him, and came, with horror in his face, straight to the place where I was standing.

`Come back to the bed, sir!' he began. He looked at me closer, and checked himself. `No!' he resumed. `Open the sealed letter first--the letter I gave you this morning.'

I opened the letter.

`Read the name, Mr. Blake, that I have written inside.'

I read the name that he had written. It was--Godfrey Ablewhite.

`Now,' said the Sergeant, `come with me, and look at the man on the bed.'

I went with him, and looked at the man on the bed.

GODFREY ABLEWHITE!


  By PanEris using Melati.

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