He was reading with close attention a report upon the chief event of the hour—­the trial of Guillaume Rodolphe at Valpre.  It had been in progress for four days, and was likely to last for several more.  The report he read was from the pen of Trevor Mordaunt, an account clear and direct as the man himself.  So far the evidence had seemed to turn in Bertrand’s favour, and, his protestations notwithstanding, it was impossible not to feel a quickening of the pulses as he realized this fact.  Would they ever send for him?  He asked himself.  Would they ever desire to do justice to the man they had degraded?

It was evident that the writer of the account before him thought so.  However Mordaunt’s opinion of the man himself had altered, his conviction on the subject of his innocence of that primary crime had plainly remained unshaken.  He had not allowed himself to be biased by subsequent events.

“And that is strange—­that!” the Frenchman murmured, with his eyes upon the article.  “Perhaps la petite Christine has convinced him.  But no—­that is not probable.”

He broke off as the door opened, and a quick smile of welcome flashed across his face.  He stretched out both hands to the new-comer.

“All right.  Sit still,” said Max.

He sauntered across the room, his coat hanging open and displaying evening dress, and gave his hand into Bertrand’s eager clasp.  It was a very cool hand, and strong with a vitality that seemed capable of imparting itself.

He looked down at Bertrand with a queer glint of tenderness in his eyes.  “I shouldn’t have come up at this hour,” he said, “but I guessed you would be awake.  How goes it, old chap?  Pretty bad, eh?”

“No, I am better,” Bertrand said.  “I am glad that you came up.”

Max drew up a chair, and sat down beside his protege.  For nearly three weeks now Bertrand had been with him.  A post-card written from a squalid back-street lodging had been his first intimation that the Frenchman was in London, and within two hours of receiving it Max had removed him to the private nursing-home in which he himself was at that time domiciled.  For, notwithstanding his youth, Max Wyndham was a privileged person, and owned as his greatest friend one of the most distinguished physicians in London.

His natural brilliance had brought him in the first place to the great man’s notice; and though he was but a medical student, his foot was already firmly planted upon the ladder of success.  There was little doubt that one day—­and that probably not many years distant—­Max Wyndham would be a great man too.  Even as it was, his grip upon all things that concerned the profession he had chosen was so prodigious that his patron would upon occasion consult with him as an equal, detecting in him that flare of genius which in itself is of more value than years of accumulated knowledge.  He had the gift of magnetism to an extraordinary degree, and he coupled with it an unerring instinct upon which he was not afraid to rely.  Equipped thus, he was bound to come to the front, though whether the Wyndham blood in him would suffer him to stay there was a proposition that time alone could solve.