Mr. Haliburton, conscious of a slight sinking sensation just below the second button of his waistcoat, moved as requested, and Hughie took out of the box a bank-book and a bulky letter. "When I came home from abroad," he said, "I found this letter awaiting me. It is from my uncle. The following passage will interest you: '... I have realised practically all my personal estate, and have placed the cash to your credit on Joey's behalf'--Joey is the name," he explained punctiliously, "by which Miss Gaymer is known to her intimate friends--'at the Law Courts Branch of the Home Counties Bank.... The rest of my property is set down and duly disposed of in my will, and cannot be touched until my death is authenticated.'" "I hope there was a respectable sum in the bank," said Mr. Haliburton, his spirits rising again. Hughie opened the pass-book. "When I went to the bank in question," he said, "and asked to be allowed to see the amount of my balance, I was handed this pass-book. From it you will gather the exact value of Miss Gaymer's fortune at the moment when I took over the management of her affairs." He handed the book to Mr. Haliburton. That devout lover glanced eagerly at the sum indicated on the balance-line--and turned a delicate green. "You see?" said Hughie calmly, taking the book back. "One hundred pounds sterling! A poor exchange for five thousand, Mr. Haliburton!" "Where is the money?" said Haliburton thickly. "That I can't tell you. But you will see by the book and this duly endorsed cheque,"--he picked a pink slip out of the dispatch-box,--"that the sum of thirty-nine thousand, nine hundred pounds--the amount he had put in a few days before, less one hundred--was drawn out of the bank, in a lump, by my uncle himself the day before he sailed. Why he did it, I can't imagine. He must have changed his plans suddenly. All I know is that he has put me in a very tight place as a trustee, and you in a much tighter one as a suitor, Mr. Haliburton!" He took the cheque from the hands of the demoralized Haliburton, and closed the dispatch-box. There was a long silence. At length Hughie said:-- "I presume I may take it that you now desire to withdraw from this engagement?" "You may!" said Mr. Haliburton emphatically. He was too deeply chagrined to play his part any longer. Hughie surveyed him critically. "You're a direct rascal, Spratt," he said; "you are no more hypocritical than you need be. But you're a rascal for all that. Well, I won't keep you. Good afternoon!" But Mr. Haliburton's quick-moving brain had been taking in the altered situation, with its strong and weak points so far as he himself was concerned. He had not lived by his wits twenty years for nothing.