It didn’t take Bob long to learn what was worrying Dickie. He was carrying the weight of a new and tremendous responsibility. He had now become an emissary, a friend in need, to Clarence and the commodore, who certainly needed one at this moment. It seemed that Mrs. Clarence and Mrs. Dan had set detectives searching for Gee-gee and Gid-up and they had succeeded in locating one of the pair, partly by a freckle and a turned-up nose. The detectives must have worked fast. They were assisted by the fact that foolish Clarence had kept up an innocent and Platonic friendship with “Gee-gee’s” chum, after that momentous evening when Bob had been along. Now when a young man begins to hang around the vicinity of a stage door in a big car, he is apt to make himself a subject for remark and to become known, especially to the door-keeper who takes a fatherly interest in his Shetland herd. As Gid-up and Gee-gee were inseparable, it was but a step to place one by the other. Detectives, Dickie informed Bob, had already interviewed the ladies. They may have offered them money in exchange for information. Mrs. Dan was very rich in her own name. She could outbid the commodore. Gid-up might hesitate or refuse to supply or manufacture information for filthy lucre, but Gee-gee was known to be ambitious. She longed to soar. And here was a means to that end. Quite a legitimate and customary one! “Why, that girl would do anything to get herself talked about,” said Dickie sadly, thinking of Dan, and incidentally, too, of Clarence. “She’d manufacture information by the car-load. Out of a little, teeny-weeny remnant of truth, she’d build a magnificent divorce case. Think of the glorious publicity! Why, Gee-gee and one of the manager-chaps would sit up nights to see how many columns they could fill each day in the press. They’d make poor old Dan out worse than Nero. They’d picture him as a monster. They’d give him claws. And Clarence would come crawling after him like a slimy snake. Incidentally, they’d throw in a few weeps for Gee-gee. And then some more for Gid-up! Why, man, when I think of the mischief you’ve done—”