“I told you I wasn’t a coward,” he answered, coolly.  “Yes, I did it; it was Whyte’s own fault.  When I met him that night he told me how Frettlby wouldn’t let him marry his daughter, but said he’d make him, and showed me the marriage certificate.  I thought if I could only get it I’d make a nice little pile out of Frettlby over it; so when Whyte went on drinking I did not.  After he had gone out of the hotel, I put on his coat, which he left behind.  I saw him standing near the lamp-post, and Fitzgerald come up and then leave him.  When you came down the street,” he went on, turning to Fitzgerald, “I shrank back into the shadow, and when you passed I ran up to Whyte as the cabman was putting him into the hansom.  He took me for you, so I didn’t undeceive him, but I swear I had no idea of murdering Whyte when I got into the cab.  I tried to get the papers, but he wouldn’t let me, and commenced to sing out.  Then I thought of the chloroform in the pocket of his coat, which I was wearing.  I pulled it out, and found that the cork was loose.  Then I took out Whyte’s handkerchief, which was also in the coat, and emptied the bottle on it, and put it back in my pocket.  I again tried to get the papers, without using the chloroform, but couldn’t, so I clapped the handkerchief over his mouth, and he went off after a few minutes, and I got the papers.  I thought he was only insensible, and it was only when I saw the newspapers that I knew he was dead.  I stopped the cab in St. Kilda Road, got out and caught another cab, which was going to town.  Then I got out at Powlett Street, took off the coat, and carried it over my arm.  I went down George Street, towards the Fitzroy Gardens, and having hid the coat up a tree, where I suppose you found it,” to Kilsip, “I walked home—­so I’ve done you all nicely, but—­”

“You’re caught at last,” finished Kilsip, quietly.

Moreland fell down in a chair, with an air of utter weariness. and lassitude.

“No man can be stronger than Destiny,” he said, dreamily.  “I have lost and you have won; so life is a chess board, after all, and we are the puppets of Fate.”

He refused to utter another word; so leaving Calton and Kilsip with him, Brian and the doctor went out and hailed a cab.  It drove up to the entrance of the court, where Calton’s office was, and then Moreland, walking as if in a dream, left the room, and got into the cab, followed by Kilsip.

“Do you know,” said Chinston, thoughtfully, as they stood and watched the cab drive off, “do you know what the end of that man will be?”

“It requires no prophet to foretell that,” said Calton, dryly.  “He will be hanged.”

“No, he won’t,” retorted the doctor.  “He will commit suicide.”

CHAPTER XXXV.

“The love that lives.”