spect that
all was not well with their married life. The Colonel caught me up.

"Of course, there was no explanation he could give except that
he'd gone off with a woman. I suppose he thought she could
find that out for herself. That's the sort of chap he was."

"What is Mrs. Strickland going to do?"

"Well, the first thing is to get our proofs. I'm going over
to Paris myself."

"And what about his business?"

"That's where he's been so artful. He's been drawing in his
horns for the last year."

"Did he tell his partner he was leaving?"

"Not a word."

Colonel MacAndrew had a very sketchy knowledge of business
matters, and I had none at all, so I did not quite understand
under what conditions Strickland had left his affairs.
I gathered that the deserted partner was very angry and
threatened proceedings. It appeared that when everything was
settled he would be four or five hundred pounds out of pocket.

"It's lucky the furniture in the flat is in Amy's name.
She'll have that at all events."

"Did you mean it when you said she wouldn't have a bob?"

"Of course I did. She's got two or three hundred pounds and
the furniture."

"But how is she going to live?"

"God knows."

The affair seemed to grow more complicated, and the Colonel,
with his expletives and his indignation, confused rather than
informed me. I was glad that, catching sight of the clock at
the Army and Navy Stores, he remembered an engagement to play
cards at his club, and so left me to cut across St. James Park.

Chapter X

A day or two later Mrs. Strickland sent me round a note asking
if I could go and see her that evening after dinner. I found
her alone. Her black dress, simple to austerity, suggested
her bereaved condition, and I was innocently astonished that
notwithstanding a real emotion she was able to dress the part
she had to play according to her notions of seemliness.

"You said that if I wanted you to do anything you wouldn't
mind doing it," she remarked.

"It was quite true."

"Will you go over to Paris and see Charlie?"

"I?"

I was taken aback. I reflected that I had only seen him once.
I did not know what she wanted me to do.

"Fred is set on going." Fred was Colonel MacAndrew. "But I'm
sure he's not the man to go. He'll only make things worse.
I don't know who else to ask."

Her voice trembled a little, and I felt a brute even to hesitate.

"But I've not spoken ten words to your husban