“I am a barrister myself, my lord,” he said—­“called some nine years ago.  I can conduct my own defence, I venture to think, better than any of these my learned brethren.”

Charles went through his examination-in-chief quite swimmingly.  He answered with promptitude.  He identified the prisoner without the slightest hesitation as the man who had swindled him under the various disguises of the Reverend Richard Peploe Brabazon, the Honourable David Granton, Count von Lebenstein, Professor Schleiermacher, Dr. Quackenboss, and others.  He had not the slightest doubt of the man’s identity.  He could swear to him anywhere.  I thought, for my own part, he was a trifle too cocksure.  A certain amount of hesitation would have been better policy.  As to the various swindles, he detailed them in full, his evidence to be supplemented by that of bank officials and other subordinates.  In short, he left Finglemore not a leg to stand upon.

When it came to the cross-examination, however, matters began to assume quite a different complexion.  The prisoner set out by questioning Sir Charles’s identifications.  Was he sure of his man?  He handed Charles a photograph.  “Is that the person who represented himself as the Reverend Richard Peploe Brabazon?” he asked persuasively.

Charles admitted it without a moment’s delay.

Just at that moment, a little parson, whom I had not noticed till then, rose up, unobtrusively, near the middle of the court, where he was seated beside Césarine.

“Look at that gentleman!” the prisoner said, waving one hand, and pouncing upon the prosecutor.

Charles turned and looked at the person indicated.  His face grew still whiter.  It was—­to all outer appearance—­the Reverend Richard Brabazon in propriâ personâ.

Of course I saw the trick.  This was the real parson upon whose outer man Colonel Clay had modelled his little curate.  But the jury was shaken.  And so was Charles for a moment.

“Let the jurors see the photograph,” the judge said, authoritatively.  It was passed round the jury-box, and the judge also examined it.  We could see at once, by their faces and attitudes, they all recognised it as the portrait of the clergyman before them—­not of the prisoner in the dock, who stood there smiling blandly at Charles’s discomfiture.

The clergyman sat down.  At the same moment the prisoner produced a second photograph.

“Now, can you tell me who that is?” he asked Charles, in the regular brow-beating Old Bailey voice.

With somewhat more hesitation, Charles answered, after a pause:  “That is yourself as you appeared in London when you came in the disguise of the Graf von Lebenstein.”

This was a crucial point, for the Lebenstein fraud was the one count on which our lawyers relied to prove their case most fully, within the jurisdiction.

Even while Charles spoke, a gentleman whom I had noticed before, sitting beside White Heather, with a handkerchief to his face, rose as abruptly as the parson.  Colonel Clay indicated him with a graceful movement of his hand.  “And this gentleman?” he asked calmly.