k--for his tempers
were short-lived--"to Brockley Court?"

"First to the left, sir, second to the right, straight on an' ask
again--only a penny, sir, climbs like all alive, sir."

Dropping a penny into the man's hand with a hope that it might help the
monkeys to climb, Captain Bream turned into the labyrinth, and soon
after found himself in a dark little room which was surrounded by piles
of japanned tin boxes, and littered with bundles of documents,
betokening the daily haunt of a man-of-law.

The lawyer himself--a bland man with a rugged head, a Roman nose and a
sharp eye--sat on a hard-bottomed chair in front of a square desk. Why
should business men, by the way, subject themselves to voluntary
martyrdom by using polished seats of hard-wood? Is it with a view to
doing penance, for the sins of the class to which they belong?

"Have you found her, Mr Saker?" asked Captain Bream, eagerly, on
entering.

"No, not got quite so far as that yet--pray sit down; but we have reason
to believe that we have got a clue--a slight one, indeed, but then, the
information we have to go upon in our profession is frequently very
slight--very slight indeed."

"True, too true," assented the captain. "I sometimes wonder how, with
so little to work on at times, you ever begin to go about an
investigation."

The lawyer smiled modestly in acknowledgment of the implied compliment.

"We do, indeed, proceed on our investigations occasionally with
exceeding little information to go upon, but then, my dear sir,
investigation may be said to be a branch of our profession, for which we
are in a manner specially trained. Let me see, now."

He took up a paper, and, opening it, began to read with a running
commentary:--

"Fair hair, slightly grey; delicate features, complexion rather pale,
brown eyes, gentle manners."

"That's her--that's her!" from the captain.

"Age apparently a little over thirty. You said, I think, that your
sister was--"

"Yes, yes," interrupted the captain in some excitement, "she was
considerably younger than me, poor girl!"

"Let me, however, caution you, my dear sir, not to be too sanguine,"
said the man-of-law, looking over his spectacles at his client; "you
have no idea how deceptive descriptions are. People are so prone to
receive them according to their desires rather than according to fact."

"Well, but," returned the captain, with some asperity, "you tell me that
this woman has fair hair slightly