deration with Insurance
Companies--to keep in touch with Mr. Potts. That gentleman had left for
the East coast a week ago, and that was the end of the matter as far as
the clerk of the Insurance Company was concerned.

At his lodgings Mr. Dunn discovered an even more callous indifference to
Mr. Potts and his interests. The landlady, under the impression that
in Mr. Dunn she beheld a prospective lodger, at first received him with
that deferential reserve which is the characteristic of respectable
lodging-house keepers in that city of respectable lodgers and
respectable lodging-house keepers. When, however, she learned the real
nature of Mr. Dunn's errand, she became immediately transformed. In a
voice shrill with indignation she repudiated Mr. Potts and his affairs,
and seemed chiefly concerned to re-establish her own reputation for
respectability, which she seemed to consider as being somewhat shattered
by that of her lodger. Mr. Dunn was embarrassed both by her volubility
and by her obvious determination to fasten upon him a certain amount of
responsibility for the character and conduct of Mr. Potts.

"Do you know where Mr. Potts is now, and have you any idea when he may
return?" inquired Mr. Dunn, seizing a fortunate pause.

"Am I no' juist tellin' ye," cried the landlady, in her excitement
reverting to her native South Country dialect, "that I keep nae coont o'
Mr. Potts' stravagins? An' as to his return, I ken naething aboot that
an' care less. He's paid what he's been owing me these three months an'
that's all I care aboot him."

"I am glad to hear that," said Mr. Dunn heartily.

"An' glad I am tae, for it's feared I was for my pay a month back."

"When did he pay up?" inquired Mr. Dunn, scenting a clue.

"A week come Saturday,--or was it Friday?--the day he came in with a
young man, a friend of his. And a night they made of it, I remember,"
replied the landlady, recovering command of herself and of her speech
under the influence of Mr. Dunn's quiet courtesy.

"Did you know the young man that was with him?"

"Yes, it was young Cameron. He had been coming about a good deal."

"Oh, indeed! And have you seen Mr. Cameron since?"

"No; he never came except in company with Mr. Potts."

And with this faint clue Mr. Dunn was forced to content himself, and to
begin a systematic search of Cameron's haunts in the various parts of
the town. It was Martin, his little quarter-back, that finally put him
on the right