‘A lady, sir, I think,’ said the policeman.

‘One Mrs. Smith.’

‘She called herself—­Caldigate, sir,’ said the policeman.  Then they went together without any further words to the mayor’s court, and from thence, before he heard the accusation made against him, he sent both for his father and for Mr. Seely.

He was taken through to a private room, and thither came at once the mayor and another magistrate of the town with whom he was acquainted.  ‘This is a very sad business, Mr. Caldigate,’ said the mayor.

’Very sad, indeed.  I suppose I know all about it.  Two men were with me yesterday threatening to indict me for bigamy if I did not give them a considerable sum of money.  I can quite understand that they should have been here, as I know the nature of the evidence they can use.  The policeman tells me the woman is here too.’

’Oh yes;—­she is here, and has made her deposition.  Indeed, there are two men and another woman who all declare that they were present at her marriage.’  Then, after some further conversation, the accusers were brought into the room before him, so that their depositions might be read to him.  The woman was closely veiled, so that he could not see a feature of her face; but he knew her figure well, and he remembered the other woman who had been half-companion half-servant to Euphemia Smith when she had come up to the diggings, and who had been with her both at Ahalala and at Nobble.  The woman’s name, as he now brought to mind, was Anna Young.  Crinkett also and Adamson followed them into the room, each of whom had made a deposition on the matter.  ’Is this the Mr. Caldigate,’ said the mayor, ‘whom you claim as your husband?’

‘He is my husband,’ said the woman.  ’He and I were married at Ahalala in New South Wales.’  ‘It is false,’ said Caldigate.

‘Would you wish to see her face?’ asked the mayor.

’No; I know her voice well.  She is the woman in whose company I went out to the Colony, and whom I knew while I was there.  It is not necessary that I should see her.  What does she say?’

‘That I am your wife, John Caldigate.’

Then the deposition was read to him, which stated on the part of the woman, that on a certain day she was married to him by the Rev. Mr. Allan, a Wesleyan minister, at Ahalala, that the marriage took place in a tent belonging, as she believed, to Mr. Crinkett, and that Crinkett, Adamson, and Anna Young were all present at the marriage.  Then the three persons thus named had taken their oaths and made their depositions to the same effect.  And a document was produced, purporting to be a copy of the marriage certificate as made out by Mr. Allan,—­copy which she, the woman, stated that she obtained at the time, the register itself, which consisted simply of an entry in a small book, having been carried away by Mr. Allan in his pocket.  Crinkett, when asked what had become of Mr. Allan, stated that he knew nothing but that he had left Ahalala.  From that day to this none of them had heard of Mr Allan.