"Ned Chester, before he left for Australia, was a thief, but at the same time a person whose manners were superior to those of his associates. He took a strange fancy, as a young man, to a child, a little girl, living in Rosemary Lane, of whose parentage nothing was known. When he left for Australia, this little girl was probably not more than five or six years of age, but I do not pledge myself to a year or two. While he was in Australia he sent her money, which the man who has brought her up received and spent. Returning home, after an absence of ten or twelve years, he renewed his acquaintance with her. She is now a very beautiful young woman.
"It was his intention to introduce himself in his proper name, having an idea that she must have been thinking of him during his absence as much as he had been thinking of her; but he amused himself at first by conversing with her as a stranger. He soon discovered that the young woman had no recollection of him, and that she had never bestowed a thought upon him; he discovered, also, that she was dissatisfied with her position in life, and that she had a fancy in her head that, because her parents were not known, she must certainly be a lady. He told her he was a gentleman, and when she asked for his name, he gave the name of Arthur Temple. He pledged her to secrecy upon this point, on the grounds that he did not wish to have anything to do with her friends and neighbours, and that family reasons required that their intimacy should for a time be kept from the knowledge of his father. He represented that, upon his father's death, who, he said, was an old man, he would come into possession of a large fortune.
"Under the name of Arthur Temple, he meets the young woman regularly. He has given her presents, and has frequently written to her upon paper bearing your father's crest.
"The name by which the young woman is known is The Duchess of Rosemary Lane.
"The man who is passing himself upon her as Arthur Temple is your valet, James Kingsford. You will thus perceive that Ned Chester, James Kingsford, and the fictitious Arthur Temple, are one and the same person.
"It is this person, also, who has uttered the forged cheques, and who has stolen the missing jewelry.
"This report is longer than I desired, but to place you in possession of all the particulars, I have found it impossible to abbreviate it."
The receipt of this communication caused Arthur Temple great excitement. It appeared to him that it was the real commencement of his life's experience. The loss of the money, and the discovery of the man who had robbed him, did not so much affect him as that portion of the narrative which related to the beautiful girl whom Ned Chester was deceiving. His imagination was stirred, and his chivalrous heart prompted him to defend and save her. He went at once in search of Richards, with the man's statement in his hand, and plunged immediately into the subject.
"I have no reason to doubt the truth of your report, Richards."
"You need have none, sir."