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 overboard the next minute and muttered something."

"Oh, you remarked that, did you?"

"Yes, and meant to ask him about it afterwards; but forgot, somehow."

"Do you remember where we were--what we were passing--when he did this?"

"Not clearly. I was infernally ill just then. Why did he do it?"

I was silent.

"I suppose it had some meaning?" he went on.

"Yes, it had. And excuse me when I say that I'm hanged if either you or your Constant Readers shall know what that meaning was. My dear fellow, you belong to a strong race--a race that has beaten us and taken toll of us, and now carves 'Smith' and 'Thompson' and such names upon our fathers' tombs. But there are some things you have not laid hands on yet; secrets that we all know somehow, but never utter, even among ourselves, nor allude to. If I told you what Billy Tredegar did to-day, and why he did it, I tell you frankly your article would make some thousands of Constant Readers open wide eyes over their