all about it,' returned Gaffer. 'I ain't one of the
supposing sort. If you'd got your living to haul out of the river every
day of your life, you mightn't be much given to supposing. Am I to show
the way?'

As he opened the door, in pursuance of a nod from Lightwood, an
extremely pale and disturbed face appeared in the doorway--the face of a
man much agitated.

'A body missing?' asked Gaffer Hexam, stopping short; 'or a body found?
Which?'

'I am lost!' replied the man, in a hurried and an eager manner.

'Lost?'

'I--I--am a stranger, and don't know the way. I--I--want to find the
place where I can see what is described here. It is possible I may know
it.' He was panting, and could hardly speak; but, he showed a copy of
the newly-printed bill that was still wet upon the wall. Perhaps its
newness, or perhaps the accuracy of his observation of its general look,
guided Gaffer to a ready conclusion.

'This gentleman, Mr Lightwood, is on that business.'

'Mr Lightwood?'

During a pause, Mortimer and the stranger confronted each other. Neither
knew the other.

'I think, sir,' said Mortimer, breaking the awkward silence with his
airy self-possession, 'that you did me the honour to mention my name?'

'I repeated it, after this man.'

'You said you were a stranger in London?'

'An utter stranger.'

'Are you seeking a Mr Harmon?'

'No.'

'Then I believe I can assure you that you are on a fruitless errand, and
will not find what you fear to find. Will you come with us?'

A little winding through some muddy alleys that might have been
deposited by the last ill-savoured tide, brought them to the
wicket-gate and bright lamp of a Police Station; where they found the
Night-Inspector, with a pen and ink, and ruler, posting up his books in
a whitewashed office, as studiously as if he were in a monastery on
top of a mountain, and no howling fury of a drunken woman were banging
herself against a cell-door in the back-yard at his elbow. With the
same air of a recluse much given to study, he desisted from his books to
bestow a distrustful nod of recognition upon Gaffer, plainly importing,
'Ah! we know all about YOU, and you'll overdo it some day;' and to
inform Mr Mortimer Lightwood and friends, that he would attend them
immediately. Then, he finished ruling the work he had in hand (it might
have been illuminating a missal, he was so calm), in a very neat and
methodical manner, showing not the slightest consciousness of