Fancy or not, the officer acted upon it. Going round by the street to the professional entrance, and so on up the passage to the private room. When Bede Greatorex returned to it, he saw him seated against the wall, underneath the map of London. "You did wrong to mention Mr. Hurst to my father," Bede began with imperative quickness, as he slipped the bolt of the middle door. "That's as it may be," was the rejoinder, cool as usual. "If there's not some outlet of suspicion given to your father, it will be just this, Mr. Bede Greatorex--that he'll make one for himself. Leastways, that's my opinion." "Be it so. I do not want it to take the direction of my clerks." "He lays the blame on us: says we are lax, or else incapable; and it is only natural he should think so. Anyway there's no harm done about Mr. Hurst: you made it right with him there. Do you suspect Hurst still, sir?" "Yes. At least more than I do any one of the others." Mr. Butterby put his hands on his knees and bent a little forward. "If you wish me to do you any service in this, sir, you must not keep me quite so much in the dark. What I want to get at, Mr. Bede Greatorex, is the true reason of your pitching upon Hurst yourself." "I cannot give it to you," said Bede promptly. "What I told you at our first interview, I repeat now--that the suspicion against him is but a faint one. Still it is sufficient to raise a doubt; and I have no reason to doubt the other three. Jenner is open and honest as the day; Brown valuable and trustworthy; and Mr. Yorke must of course be exempt." "Oh, of course he must," dryly acquiesced the detective with a cough. He knew he was sure of Roland in this case, but he thought Bede Greatorex might not have spoken so confidently had he been cognizant of a certain matter connected with the past. "I would not much mind answering for Jenner myself," remarked Mr. Butterby. "Brown seems all right, too. "Brown's honesty has been sufficiently proved. Very large sums have passed through his hands habitually, and he has never wronged us by a shilling. Had he wished to help himself, he would have done it before now: he has had the opportunity." "Then that leaves us back at Hurst again. Where is your objection, sir, to the doubt of him being mentioned to your father?" A kind of startled look crossed Bede's face: a look of fear: and he spoke hastily. "Have you forgotten what I said? That the fact of Mr. Hurst's knowing he was suspected (assuming he is guilty) would be attended with danger. Awful danger, too. If it were possible to disclose all to my father, he would forfeit a great deal that he holds dear in life, rather than incur it." "Well it seems to me that I can be of little use in this matter," said Butterby, turning somewhat crusty. "I have had dangerous secrets confided to me in my lifetime, sir; and the parties they were told of are none the wiser or the worse for it yet."