uthority for this last axiom, one would perhaps turn rather to the
popular theologians).

Of the truth of the first proposition, that worthy young man, Andrew
Walkingshaw, was an unhappy example. It is the case that his parent's
disappearance was not without compensating advantages. He was spared a
number of minor annoyances, which of late had been the undeserved
accompaniment of his blameless life; but then, the mystery of that
disappearance, its unorthodoxy, its appalling suggestions of scandal!
He knew now what it must feel like to have a relative engaged upon
fashionable divorce proceedings or conspicuously notorious on
the music-hall stage. For, despite his industry in circulating a
circumstantial account of the business that had called the head of the
firm so suddenly away, he thought he observed in the face of every
acquaintance a kind of sly and knowing expression. "Aha!" every one of
them seemed to say, "I've got my knife into _you_, Andrew!"

Beneath the roof of the respectable mansion in which he had hitherto
spent a life unsullied by mystery or romance he found, to his horror,
that these sinister manifestations were even more marked than in his
club. The restored happiness of Jean was a bad sign, very ominous under
the circumstances. It is true that she professed complete ignorance of
their father's movements, but Andrew was too astute a lawyer to pay much
attention to what people said; it was how they behaved that he went by;
and Jean's conduct was suspicious. Why should she be smiling while this
dark cloud hung over their reputations? The like of that looked very
bad. He resolved to probe the matter a bit further.

"There's some one wanting to know where Frank has got to," he began,
with an ingenuous air, when he met her next.

"What does he want to see him about?" inquired Jean.

"He didn't say, but I thought perhaps you had heard Frank mention where
he was going. Did you by any chance?"

His air remained as ingenuous as ever, but Jean looked at him
doubtfully. For a moment she hesitated.

"Yes," she said.

"Oh, where was it?"

"Of course I don't know whether he has gone there."

"The chances are he has," said Andrew. "What was his intention?"

"Who was the man that wanted to know?"

Andrew was particularly scrupulous never to deviate far from the high
road of truth. Of course there were footpaths alongside that led to the
same place, and gave one a certain amount of latitude; but beyond the