"Friend Othniel."
"What! here, on board the yacht?"
"Yes," said Marchmont, "on board this yacht. And he can prove that what I say is true."
"What? About the Bishop?" she cried, her voice quivering with suppressed merriment.
"Certainly," replied the journalist. "After his release from the Black Maria he tells substantially your story, but gives the Bishop the part you have carefully assigned to his innocent son."
At this she once more broke into peals of laughter, but at last, recovering her speech, managed to gasp out:
"Bring him here, and see what he says."
"I will," said Marchmont, hurriedly leaving the cabin, for her marvellous self-possession was beginning to arouse unpleasant suspicions even in his mind.
"But what does it all mean?" queried the Bishop helplessly, after the journalist's departure. "How dare he say such things about me! I drive a prison-van, indeed!"
"I'll tell you," she replied, striving to control her voice. "It's the greatest practical joke that ever was. We called your son 'the Bishop,' just as a nickname, you see, and of course the tramp heard us, and, after we dropped him in Montreal, must have blown the whole thing to Marchmont out of spite, and, not knowing any better, he thought your son really was the Bishop."