Japanese Causes Cefebres. IV. On the morrow her messenger presented himself in due time, and was shown into Oka's presence as soon as the latter was at leisure. He was a good-looking man, not yet in the prime of life, and gave the name of — Monzo. When Oka heard this name, his heart beat triumphantly within him, for now he knew that his intelligence had not erred and that the author of the crime was before him. But he blandly said : " You arc the widow's messenger, are you? Well, it is certainly very kind in you to take so much trouble on her account, and she is to be congrat ulated on having such a faithful friend. By the way, what is your age?" "I am just thirty-five years old," answered the widow's friend, who wondered why the judge cared to be informed on this point. " And are you married?" continued Oka, twining the net of interrogation still tighter about the un suspecting Monzo. " I was married several years ago," he replied, " but my wife died, and I have no children." "Now, as to this robber who murdered Sannosukc," went on Oka, going suddenly to the subject of the crime, " As you knew the deceased intimately, you doubtless have some information as to the identity of the assailant; have you not?" " I, your Honor?" exclaimed Monzo, indignantly, " how should I know who murdered Sannosuke? I was an intimate friend of his, but I was not his keeper." Then the Lord of Echizen leaned back and laughed loud and long. Three times had Monzo directly contradicted the story of the dead man's widow. The miserable man turned pale, for the magistrate's laughter boded ill. "Why," said the magistrate, "were you such a wretch as to murder one who was your friend? " "You are mistaken sir," protested Monzo; "I am no murderer. What proof have you that I killed San nosuke?" "Proof, you knave? Do you ask me for proof? Well, you shall hear. When
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the widow came here yesterday, she told me that an intimate friend had brought her in formation of the death of Sannosuke, and that you were this intimate friend. She was particular to state, in order to dispel the sus picion which her guilty mind foresaw, that you were over fifty years old — which you are not, — and that you had a family, — which you have not. This eagerness of yours to tell the news, this sole possession of it by yourself, seemed worth inquiring into; and the result of my men's search in your house was this purse of Sannosuke, which I now hold," showing it, " and the bloody sword of yours, which you see over there. The law forbids me to condemn you without a confession; but your guilt is clear, and you may as well own to your villainy." At this sudden turn of affairs Monzo was confounded; his heart failed him, and he made a complete confession. It seemed that he and Sannosuke's wife, already too inti mate, had plotted to put Sannosuke out of the way at an early opportunity. His errand at the bank had furnished a good chance, to give to the crime the appearance of an or dinary highway robbery, and the affair was further assisted by the accident of Yaichi's midnight adventure in the same ward, and by Yaichi's foolish fabrication. Monzo and the widow, of course, suffered the penalty of their crime on the scaffold at the Kozuka Field. As for Yaichi, the emi nent magistrate, on releasing him, gave him a well-timed lecture on the folly of his habit of lying, and Yaichi's thankfulness at his escape was such that for some time he was never known to change one tittle of the truth. But indeed the story of his dan ger was marvelous enough in itself to re lieve him for a while from any temptation to invent. He was never tired of telling it with increasing embellishments, and among the neighbors and townspeople it became known ever after as "A Braggart's Narrow Escape."
