cht had not returned last night, nor
has it been seen or heard of since its departure. Various Berwick
fishing craft have been out well off the coast during today, but no
tidings of the missing gentlemen have come to hand. Nothing has been
heard of, or from, Sir Gilbert at Hathercleugh up to nine o'clock this
evening, and the only ray of hope lies in the fact that Mr. Moneylaws'
mother left the town hurriedly this afternoon--possibly having received
some news of her son. It is believed here, however, that the light vessel
was capsized in a sudden squall, and that both occupants have lost their
lives. Sir Gilbert Carstairs, who was the seventh baronet, had only
recently come to the neighbourhood on succeeding to the title and
estates. Mr. Moneylaws, who was senior clerk to Mr. Lindsey, solicitor,
of Berwick, was a very promising young man of great ability, and had
recently been much before the public eye as a witness in connection with
the mysterious murders of John Phillips and Abel Crone, which are still
attracting so much attention."

I shoved the newspaper into Mr. Lindsey's hand as he came out of the
telegraph office. He read the paragraph in silence, smiling as he read.

"Aye!" he said at last, "you have to leave home to get the home news.
Well--they're welcome to be thinking that for the present. I've just
wired Murray that I'll be here till at any rate this evening, and that
he's to telegraph at once if there's tidings of that yacht or of
Carstairs. Meanwhile, well go and see this Mr. Smeaton."

Mr. Smeaton was expecting us--he, too, was reading about me in the
_Advertiser_ when we entered, and he made some joking remark about it
only being great men that were sometimes treated to death-notices before
they were dead. And then he turned to Mr. Lindsey, who I noticed had been
taking close stock of him.

"I've been thinking out things since Mr. Moneylaws was in here last
night," he remarked. "Bringing my mind to bear, do you see, on certain
points that I hadn't thought of before. And maybe there's something more
than appears at first sight in yon man John Phillips having my name and
address on him."

"Aye?" asked Mr. Lindsey, quietly. "How, now?"

"Well," replied Mr. Smeaton, "there may be something in it, and there may
be nothing--just nothing at all. But it's the fact that my father hailed
from Tweedside--and from some place not so far from Berwick."

CHAPTER XXIII

FAMILY HISTORY

I was watchin