t smoke so many cigarettes."

"Harmless," he assured her. "I don't inhale."

"I think," she said, "that I shall come over next month."

"Do!" he begged. "I'll answer for the bridge. May I come and lunch
to-morrow?"

She turned to a red morocco book by her side.

"A bishop and Lady Sarah," she said. "Several more parsons, and I think
the duchess."

"I'll face 'em," he declared.

"I think I shall send for Peggy," Wilhelmina said. "She is always so
sweet to the Church."

Deyes grinned.

"I shall go round and look her up," he declared. "Perhaps she'll come
and have lunch with me somewhere."

She held out her hand.

"You're a good sort to have gone over for me," she said. "The things you
tumbled up against you'd better forget."

"Until you remind me of them," he said. "Very well, I'll do that. Sorry
I didn't run Johnny to earth."

He went off, and Wilhelmina after a few minutes went to her desk and
wrote a letter to Stephen Hurd.

"As usual," she wrote, "when you were here this morning I forgot
to mention several matters upon which I meant to speak to you.
The first is with regard to the man whose brutal assault upon
your father caused his death. I understand that the police have
never traced him, have never even found the slightest clue to
his whereabouts. The more I think of this, the more strange it
seems to me, and I am inclined to believe that he never, after
all, escaped from the wood in which he first took shelter. I
know that the slate quarry was dragged at the time, but I have
been told that this was hastily done, and that there are several
very deep holes into which the man's body may have drifted. I
wish you, therefore, to send over to Nottingham to get some
experienced men to bring back the drags and make an exhaustive
search. Please have this done without delay.

"Further, I wish to communicate with the young man Macheson, who
was in Thorpe at the time. They may know his address at the
post-office, but if you are unable to procure it in any other
way, you must advertise in your own name. Please carry out my
instructions in these two matters immediately."

Wilhelmina laid down her pen and looked thoughtfully through the window
into the square. A policeman was coming slowly along the pavement. She
watched him approach and pass the house, his eyes still fixed in front
of him, his whole appearance stolid and matter-of-f