ing hold on him. Any such
connection would account for his agitation, for his denying her, for his
son's ignorance. Only it wouldn't account for young Pillin's saying that
old Heythorp had made the settlement. He could only have got that from
the woman herself. Still, to make absolutely sure, he had better try and
see her. But how? It would never do to ask Bob Pillin for an
introduction, after this interview with his father. He would have to go
on his own and chance it. Wrote stories did she? Perhaps a newspaper
would know her address; or the Directory would give it--not a common
name! And, hot on the scent, he drove to a post office. Yes, there it
was, right enough! "Larne, Mrs. R., 23, Millicent Villas." And thinking
to himself: 'No time like the present,' he turned in that direction. The
job was delicate. He must be careful not to do anything which might
compromise his power of making public use of his knowledge. Yes-ticklish!
What he did now must have a proper legal bottom. Still, anyway you looked
at it, he had a right to investigate a fraud on himself as a shareholder
of "The Island Navigation Company," and a fraud on himself as a creditor
of old Heythorp. Quite! But suppose this Mrs. Larne was really
entangled with old Pillin, and the settlement a mere reward of virtue,
easy or otherwise. Well! in that case there'd be no secret commission to
make public, and he needn't go further. So that, in either event, he
would be all right. Only--how to introduce himself? He might pretend he
was a newspaper man wanting a story. No, that wouldn't do! He must not
represent that he was what he was not, in case he had afterwards to
justify his actions publicly, always a difficult thing, if you were not
careful! At that moment there came into his mind a question Bob Pillin
had asked the other night. "By the way, you can't borrow on a
settlement, can you? Isn't there generally some clause against it?" Had
this woman been trying to borrow from him on that settlement? But at this
moment he reached the house, and got out of his cab still undecided as to
how he was going to work the oracle. Impudence, constitutional and
professional, sustained him in saying to the little maid:

"Mrs. Larne at home? Say Mr. Charles Ventnor, will you?"

His quick brown eyes took in the apparel of the passage which served for
hall--the deep blue paper on the walls, lilac-patterned curtains over the
doors, the well-known print o