Jack, glancing at the pale cowed woman, did not put the question he intended, as he followed her up the stairs. At the top she struck a light. "The poor gentleman has been sadly ill," she said tremulously. "And is still in bed?" "Oh yes, sir." She went to the side of the bed as she spoke, and pulled back a curtain. Ibbetson almost started at the gaunt, death-stricken face which met his view. He said quietly: "I must apologise for disturbing you, Mr Smith, and I am very sorry to see you so ill." "Better now, thank you." "I have come from London on purpose to ask you a question, and have had no end of difficulty in finding you out. I come from Clive Masters." "Poor old Clive! He didn't think when we parted it would be so long before I saw him again. I just came down to these lodgings to get a breath of fresh air from Saturday to Monday, and here I've been ever since. I did rather wonder that Clive had never sent or written." "He did not know where you were." Smith shook his head feebly. "Oh yes, he knew. I had one visitor from him, his cousin, Mr Trent. He came after the fifty pounds which had been left in my hands. You see, for a long time I was quite unconscious, so of course it gave Masters a good deal of anxiety. But it was no fault of mine." He stopped, gasping for breath. "Did Mr Trent get the fifty pounds?" asked Jack. "Of course. Didn't Masters tell you?" Smith said in some surprise. The woman had crept downstairs again, they could hear her husband's grumbling tones and her faint replies. Jack stood looking with some perplexity at the wasted frame, wondering how much he ought to tell. He decided to tell him all. "He did not so much as know it himself," he said quietly. "From some motive or other, Mr Trent has advanced him the money but has never told him that it was his own, and received from you." Smith stared at him. He passed his thin hand across his forehead, lifting the lank hair. "I don't understand," he said. Jack left his words to reach his comprehension without repeating them. "That can't be so," Smith said presently, "because Clive knew he had only to apply to me." "He had no address." "He could get it." "No. That is just what he could not do. Mr Smith," said Jack abruptly, "from all I can hear there has been no fault whatever on your side, and you could have done nothing. Mr Trent has chosen to keep your whereabouts concealed, and to get things into his own hands. But the upshot is that Clive has been miserable, has tried to make a bolt for America, and that I came down here to-day on the strength of a clue which we drew out of your London landlady yesterday." "But the money is gone!" said Smith in a hoarse voice. "He must have done it only to give Clive a lesson--don't you think so?" "Perhaps," Ibbetson said laconically. "And he won't deny that I gave it?" "I think not. At any rate I shall know, and so will Clive, and--no, I don't think he will deny."