Fanny glanced in Leavesley's direction, and then she and her companion walked away down Southampton Row, Hancock walking with his long stride; Fanny trotting beside him, neither, apparently, speaking one to the other. Leavesley followed full of amazement. He could tell from his uncle's manner of walking, and from the way he wore his hat, that he was either irritated or perplexed. He walked hurriedly, and, viewed from behind, he had the appearance of a physician who was going to an urgent case. Much marvelling, the artist followed. He saw Hancock hail a passing four-wheeler, and open the door. Fanny got in, her companion gave some directions to the driver, got in after the girl, closed the door, and the cab drove off. "Now, what on earth can this mean?" asked Mr Leavesley, taking off his hat and drawing his hand across his brow. Disgust at being robbed of Fanny struggled in his mind with a feeling of pure, unadulterated wonder. CHAPTER IV HANCOCK & HANCOCK Frank Leavesley's uncle, Mr James Hancock of Gordon Square and Southampton Row, Solicitor, was, in the year of this story, still unmarried. The firm of Hancock & Hancock had thrived in Bloomsbury for upwards of a hundred years. By a judicious exercise of the art of dropping bad clients and picking up good, and retaining the good when picked up, it had built for itself a business second to none in the soliciting world of the Metropolis. To be a successful solicitor is not so easy a matter as you may suppose. Take your own case, for instance, and imagine how many men you would trust with the fact that your wife is in a madhouse and not on a visit to her aunt; with the reason why your son requires cutting off with a shilling; why you have to pay so much a month to So-and-so--and so on. How many men would you trust with your title-deeds, and bonds, and scrip, even as you would trust yourself? The art of inspiring confidence combined with the less facile arts of straight dealing and right living, had placed the Hancocks in the first rank of their profession, and kept them there for over a hundred years. James, the last of the race, was in personal appearance typical of his forebears. Rather tall, thin, with a high colour suggestive of port wine, and a fidgety manner, you would never have guessed him at first sight to be one of the keenest business men in London, the depository of awful secrets, and the instigator and successful leader of legal forlorn hopes. His dress was genteel, verging on the shabby, a hideous brown horse-hair watch guard crossed his waistcoat, and he habitually carried an umbrella that would have damned the reputation of any struggling professional man.