Gwynplaine adored Dea, and Dea idolised Gwynplaine.

“You are beautiful,” she would say to him.  The crowd only saw his face; for Dea, Gwynplaine was the person who had saved her from the tomb, and who was always kind and good-tempered.  “The blind see the invisible,” said Ursus.

The old caravan had given way to a great van—­called the Green Box—­drawn by a pair of stout horses.  Gwynplaine had become famous.  In every fair-ground the crowd ran after him.

In 1705 the Green Box arrived in London and was established at Southwark, in the yard of the Tadcaster Inn.  A placard was hung up with the following inscription, composed by Ursus: 

“Here can be seen Gwynplaine, deserted, when he was ten years old, on January 29, 1690, on the coast of Portland, by the rascally Comprachicos.  The boy now grown up is known as ‘The Man who Laughs.’”

All Southwark came to see Gwynplaine, and soon people heard of him on the other side of London Bridge, and crowds came from the City to the Tadcaster Inn.  It was not long before the fashionable world itself was drawn to the Laughing Man.

One morning a constable and an officer of the High Court summoned Gwynplaine to Southwark Gaol.  Ursus watched him disappear behind the heavy door with a heavy heart.

Gwynplaine was taken down flights of stairs and dark passages till he reached the torture-chamber.  A man’s body lay on the ground on its back.  Its four limbs, drawn to four columns by chains, were in the position of a St. Andrew’s Cross.  A plate of iron, with five or six large stones, was placed on the victim’s chest.  On a seat close by sat an old man—­the sheriff of the county of Surrey.

“Come closer,” said the sheriff to Gwynplaine.  Then he addressed the wretched man on the floor, who for four days, in spite of torture, had kept silence.

“Speak, unhappy man.  Have pity on yourself.  Do what is required of you.  Open your eyes, and see if you know this man.”

The prisoner saw Gwynplaine.  Raising his head he looked at him, and then cried out, “That’s him!  Yes—­that’s him!”

“Registrar, take down that statement,” said the sheriff.

The cry of the prisoner overwhelmed Gwynplaine.  He was terrified by a confession that was unintelligible to him, and began in his distress to stammer and protest his innocence.  “Have pity on me, my lord.  You have before you only a poor mountebank—­”

“I have before me,” said the sheriff, “Lord Fermain Clancharlie, Baron Clancharlie and Hunkerville, and a peer of England!”

Then the sheriff, rising, offered his seat with a bow to Gwynplaine, saying, “My lord, will you please to be seated?”

III.—­The House of Lords

Before he left the prison the sheriff explained to Gwynplaine how it was he was Lord Clancharlie.

The bottle containing the documents which had been thrown into the sea in January 1690 had at last come to shore, and had been duly received at the Admiralty by a high official named Barkilphedro.