ut now--do you think
this man Phillips may have been my father?"

"Well," replied Mr. Lindsey, reflectively, "it's an odd thing that
Phillips, whoever he was, drew five hundred pounds in cash out of the
British Linen Bank at Peebles, and carried it straight away to
Tweedside--where you believe your father came from. It looks as if
Phillips had meant to do something with that cash--to give it to
somebody, you know."

"I read the description of Phillips in the newspapers," remarked Smeaton.
"But, of course, it conveyed nothing to me."

"You've no photograph of your father?" asked Mr. Lindsey.

"No--none--never had," answered Smeaton. "Nor any papers of his--except
those bits of letters."

Mr. Lindsey sat in silence for a time, tapping the point of his stick on
the floor and staring at the carpet.

"I wish we knew what that man Gilverthwaite was wanting at Berwick and in
the district!" he said at last.

"But isn't that evident?" suggested Smeaton. "He was looking in the
parish registers. I've a good mind to have a search made in those
quarters for particulars of my father."

Mr. Lindsey gave him a sharp look.

"Aye!" he said, in a rather sly fashion. "But--you don't know if your
father's real name was Smeaton!"

Both Smeaton and myself started at that--it was a new idea. And I saw
that it struck Smeaton with great force.

"True!" he replied, after a pause. "I don't! It might have been. And in
that case--how could one find out what it was?"

Mr. Lindsey got up, shaking his head.

"A big job!" he answered. "A stiff job! You'd have to work back a long
way. But--it could be done. What time can I look in this afternoon, Mr.
Smeaton, to get a glance at those letters?"

"Three o'clock," replied Smeaton. He walked to the door of his office
with us, and he gave me a smile. "You're none the worse for your
adventure, I see," he remarked. "Well, what about this man
Carstairs--what news of him?"

"We'll maybe be able to tell you some later in the day," replied Mr.
Lindsey. "There'll be lots of news about him, one way or another, before
we're through with all this."

We went out into the street then, and at his request I took Mr. Lindsey
to the docks, to see the friendly skipper, who was greatly delighted to
tell the story of my rescue. We stopped on his ship talking with him
for a good part of the morning, and it was well past noon when we went
back to the hotel for lunch. And the first thing we saw there was a
te