"Dear me! May I ask what they are?"

"I will translate them into facts," Francis replied. "I wish your
daughter to become my wife."

"You amaze me!" Sir Timothy exclaimed, with the old mocking smile at his
lips. "How can you possibly contemplate association with the daughter of
a man whom you suspect and distrust as you do me?"

"If I suspect and distrust you, it is your own fault," Francis reminded
him. "You have declared yourself to be a criminal and a friend of
criminals. I am inclined to believe that you have spoken the truth. I
care for that fact just as little as I care for the fact that you are a
millionaire, or that Margaret has been married to a murderer. I intend
her to become my wife."

"Did you encourage her to leave me?"

"I did not. I had not the slightest idea that she had left The Sanctuary
until Lady Cynthia told me, halfway to London this morning."

Sir Timothy was silent for several moments.

"Have you any idea in your own mind," he persisted, "as to where she has
gone and for what purpose?"

"Not the slightest in the world," Francis declared. "I am just as
anxious to hear from her; and to know where she is, as you seem to be."

Sir Timothy sighed.

"I am disappointed," he admitted. "I had hoped to obtain some
information from you. I must try in another direction."

"Since you are here, Sir Timothy," Francis said, as his visitor prepared
to depart, "may I ask whether you have any objection to my marrying your
daughter?"

Sir Timothy frowned.

"The question places me in a somewhat difficult position," he replied
coldly. "In a certain sense I have a liking for you. You are not quite
the ingenuous nincompoop I took you for on the night of our first
meeting. On the other hand, you have prejudices against me. My harmless
confession of sympathy with criminals and their ways seems to have
stirred up a cloud of suspicion in your mind. You even employ a
detective to show the world what a fool he can look, sitting in a punt
attempting to fish, with one eye on the supposed abode of crime."

"I have nothing whatever to do with the details of Shopland's
investigations," Francis protested. "He is in search of Reggie Wilmore."

"Does he think I have secret dungeons in my new abode," Sir Timothy
demanded, "or oubliettes in which I keep and starve brainless youths for
some nameless purpose? Be reasonable, Mr. Ledsam. What the devil benefit
could accrue to me from abducting or imprisoning or in any