he
had once more bestowed him in the coupe brougham, dug him in the ribs.
"Tertius!" he said, with something like a dry chuckle. "What an
extraordinary thing it is that people can go about the world unconscious
that other folks are taking a very close and warm interest in them! Now,
I'll lay a pound to a penny that Barthorpe hasn't a ghost of a notion
that he's already under suspicion. My idea of the affair, sir, is that
he has not the mere phantasm of such a thing. And yet, from now, as our
friend there observed, Master Barthorpe, sir, will be watched. Shadowed,
Tertius, shadowed!"

Barthorpe Herapath certainly had none of the notions of which Mr.
Halfpenny spoke. He spent his afternoon, once having quitted Burchill's
flat, in a businesslike fashion. He visited the estate office in
Kensington; he went to see the undertaker who had been charged with the
funeral arrangements; he called in at the local police-office and saw
the inspector and the detective who had first been brought into
connection with the case; he made some arrangements with the Coroner's
officer about the necessary inevitable inquest. He did all these things
in the fashion of a man who has nothing to fear, who is unconscious that
other men are already eyeing him with suspicion. And he was quite
unaware that when he left his office in Craven Street that evening he
was followed by a man who quietly attended him to his bachelor rooms in
the Adelphi, who waited patiently until he emerged from them to dine at
a neighboring restaurant, who himself dined at the same place, and who
eventually tracked him to Maida Vale and watched him enter Calengrove
Mansions.

CHAPTER XII

FOR TEN PER CENT

Mr. Frank Burchill welcomed his visitor with easy familiarity--this might
have been a mere dropping-in of one friend to another, for the very
ordinary purpose of spending a quiet social hour before retiring for the
night. There was a bright fire on the hearth, a small smoking-jacket on
Burchill's graceful shoulders and fancy slippers on his feet; decanters
and glasses were set out on the table in company with cigars and
cigarettes. And by the side of Burchill's easy chair was a pile of
newspapers, to which he pointed one of his slim white hands as the two men
settled themselves to talk.

"I've been reading all the newspapers I could get hold of," he observed.
"Brought all the latest editions in with me after dinner. There's little
more known, I think, than wh