f confidence, had once
told him that he and Noah were orphans, and hadn't a blood-relation in
the world.

According to all that was brought out, matters went quite smoothly and
pleasantly at the Admiral Parker until the 5th of March, 1912--three
days, it will be observed, before I myself left London for Ravensdene
Court. On that date, Salter Quick, who had a banking account at a
Plymouth bank (to which he had been introduced by Noah, who also
banked there), cashed a check for sixty pounds. That was in the
morning--in the early afternoon, he went away, remarking to the
barmaid at his brother's inn that he was first going to London and
then north. Noah accompanied him to the railway station. As far as
any one knew, Salter was not burdened by any luggage, even by a
handbag.

After he had gone, things went on just as usual at the Admiral Parker.
Neither the housekeeper, nor the barmaid, nor the potman, could
remember that the place was visited by any suspicious characters, nor
that its landlord showed any signs of having any trouble or any
extraordinary business matters. Everything was as it should be, when,
on the evening of the 9th of March (the very day on which I met Salter
Quick on the Northumbrian coast), Noah told his housekeeper and
barmaid that he had to go over to Saltash, to see a man on business,
and should be back about closing-time. He went away about seven
o'clock, but he was not back at closing-time. The potman sat up for
him until midnight: he was not back then. And none of his people at
the Admiral Parker heard any more of him until just after breakfast
next morning, when the police came and told them that their employer's
body had been found at a lonely spot on the bank of the river a little
above Saltash, and that he had certainly been murdered.

There were some points of similarity between the murders of Salter
Quick and Noah Quick. The movements and doings of each man were
traceable up to a certain point, after which nothing whatever could be
discovered respecting them. As regards Noah Quick he had crossed the
river between Keyham and Saltash by the ferry-boat, landing just
beneath the great bridge which links Devon with Cornwall. It was then
nearly dark, but he was seen and spoken to by several men who knew him
well. He was seen, too, to go up the steep street towards the head of
the queer old village: there he went into one of the inns, had a glass
of whisky at the bar, exchanged a word or two wi