"I don't like that," pursued Mr. Butterby, after a revolving pause. "When folks are haunted by dead men's spirits--leastways, fancy they are--it bodes a conscience not at rest in regard to the dead. To-night her face was pale and red by turns; her fingers shook so they had to clutch her work; she won't talk of it; she left the room to avoid me. And," continued Mr. Butterby, "she was the only one, so far as can be yet seen, that was for any length of time in the house between half-past seven and eight on Monday evening. A quarter of an hour finding a sleeve-pattern! "I don't say it was her; I've not got as far as that yet, by a long way. I don't yet say it was not as the jury brought it in. But she was in the house for that quarter of an hour, unaccounting for her stay in accordance with any probability; and I'm inclined to think that Godfrey Pitman _must have been out of it before the harm was done_. Nevertheless, appearances is deceitful, deductions sometimes wrong, and while I keep a sharp eye on the lady, I shall look _you_ up, Mr. Godfrey Pitman." One drawback against the "looking up" was--and Mr. Butterby felt slightly conscious of it as he rose from his seat before the fire--that he had never seen Godfrey Pitman in his life; and did not know whence he came or whither he might have gone. END OF THE PROLOGUE. PART THE SECOND. The Story. CHAPTER VII. IN THE OFFICE. The morning sun was shining on the house of Greatorex and Greatorex. It was a busy day in April. London was filling; people were flocking to town; the season was fairly inaugurated, the law courts were full of life. The front door stood open; the inner door, closed, could be pushed back at will. It bore a brass plate with the inscription, "Greatorex and Greatorex, Solicitors," and it had a habit, this inner door, of swinging-to upon clients' heels as they went out, for the spring was sharp. In the passage which the door closed in, was a room on either hand. The one on the left was inscribed outside, "Clerks' Office "; that on the right, "Mr. Bede Greatorex."