"Well, it doth not matter whether you speak or no, that is as far as it concerneth me. As for you, it mattereth much. But there is the other matter; tell me what you know concerning that?"

Whether I was wise or no I will not try to say, but I told him what I had seen.

"You say you saw this contract?"

"Yes, sire, I saw it."

"Signed by me?"

"The name of Charles Stuart was affixed to it."

He took a pen from a table and scribbled hastily on a piece of paper.

"Like that?" he asked.

"A facsimile of that, sire," I replied.

For a time he was silent, and he took several turns up and down the room, as though he were thinking.