ose of?"

He passed into a vein so chatty and so amiable that Gammon began to
repent of distrusting him. Besides, his information might be really
valuable and could not easily be obtained in any other way.

"Look here, Greenacre, I don't see why I shouldn't tell you. The fact
is, a man I used to know has disappeared, and I want to find him. He
was seen at the theatre with a lady who lives at that house; that's the
long and the short of it."

"Good! Now we're getting on in the old way. Age of the man about fifty,
eh? And if I remember you said he was like Quodling in the face,
Francis Quodling? Just so. H'm. I can assure you, then, that no such
individual lives at the house we're speaking of."

"No, but perhaps--"

"One moment. The Gildersleeves are a young married couple. With them
lives an older lady--"

Greenacre paused, meditating.

"The name of the missing man?" he added gently.

"Fellow called Clover."

"Clover--clover? _Clo_--"

Greenacre's first repetition of the name was mechanical, the next
sounded a note of confused surprise, the third broke short in a very
singular way, just as if his eyes had suddenly fallen on something
which startled him into silence. Yet no one had entered the room, no
face had appeared at the door.

"What's up?" asked Gammon.

The other regained his self-possession, as though he had for a moment
wandered mentally from the subject they were discussing.

"Forgive me. What name did you say? Yes, yes, Clover. Odd name. Tell me
something about him. Where did you know him? What was he?"

Having gone so far, Gammon saw no reason for refusing the details of
the story. With the pleasure that every man feels in narrating
circumstances known only to a few, he told all he could about the
career of Mrs. Clover's husband. Greenacre listened with a placidly
smiling attention.

"Just the kind of thing I am always coming across," he remarked.
"Everyday story in London. We must find this man. Do you know his
Christian name?"

Mrs. Clover called him Mark.

"Mark? May or may not be his own, of course. And now, if you permit the
question, who saw this man and recognized him in the theatre?"

Gammon gave a laugh. Then, fearing that he might convey a wrong
impression, he answered seriously that it was a niece of Mrs. Clover, a
young lady with whom he was on friendly terms, nothing whatever but
friendly terms; a most respectable young lady--anxious, naturally, to
bring Mrs. Clover and h