But now Chandler disappeared. He thought the point of law would go against him; that the mortgagee would press for the return of the £500 which he had recovered from the Hundred; that his master, Mr. Hill, had now strong doubts of his good faith. The first of these fears was verified; on argument of the point of law the Abingdon verdict was set aside. There was good cause for Chandler's other fears also. News now came of the great bulk of the other notes; they reached the bank from Amsterdam through brokers named Solomons, who had bought them from one "John Smith," a person answering to the description of Chandler, who in signing the receipt "wrote his name as if it had been wrote with a skewer." The indefatigable Mr. Wise presently found that Chandler had been in Holland with a trader named Casson, and then unearthed Casson himself. All this time Mr. Hill was in indirect communication with Chandler, writing letters to him by name "at Easton in Suffolk, to be left for him at the Crown at Ardley, near Colchester, in Essex." Thither Mr. Wise followed him, accompanied by the mortgagee, Mr. Winter, and the "Holland trader," Mr. Casson, who was ready to identify Chandler. They reached the Crown at Ardley, and actually saw a letter "stuck behind the plates of the dresser," awaiting Chandler, who rode in once a fortnight, from a distance, for "his mare seemed always to be very hard rid." There was nothing known of a place called Easton; but Aston and Assington were both suggested to the eastward, and in search of them Mr. Wise with his friends rode through Ipswich as far as Southwold, and there found Easton, "a place washed by the sea," where he halted, "being thus pretty sure of going no farther eastward." But the scent was false, and although they ran down a young man whom they proposed to arrest with the assistance of "three [Illustration: PUNISHMENT BY PILLORY.] fellows from the Keys, who appeared to be smugglers, for they were pretty much maimed and scarred," the person was clearly not Chandler. So, finding they had been "running the wrong hare," they "trailed very coolly all the way back to Ipswich." Travelling homeward, they halted a night at Colchester, and called at an inn, the Three Crowns, or the Three Cups, where Chandler had been seen a few months before. Here, as a fact, after overrunning their game near fourscore miles, "they got back to the very form," yet even now they lost their hare. This inn was kept by Chandler himself, in partnership with his brother-in-law, who naturally would not betray him, and carefully concealed the fact that Chandler was at that very time in the house.