The marriage followed with little delay, and Mr Thursley’s settlements on his daughter were not illiberal. Gervase paid but little attention to these business preliminaries, except to settle the ten thousand pounds so opportunely but so unsatisfactorily bestowed upon him, upon Madeline; it seemed to him that he had nothing to do with the matter. The house sold well, and brought him enough for his merely personal needs, and it was a kind of relief to his mind that the equivocal ten thousand did not, so to speak, soil his own fingers at all, but went at once to Madeline--which was a fantastical consolation, since, of course, their produce formed a large part of the income upon which the young pair had to live. They set themselves up in a pretty old-fashioned house, happily discovered in a ramble, and bearing a dilapidated aspect which delighted both. They made of it a paradise, according to their enlightened notions, too enlightened to be altogether in bondage to Liberty and Burnet, yet using these pioneers of art judiciously, and finding a great deal of entertainment in the old furniture shops through which they made many raids, scorning the recognised artists in that particular, the Gillows, and the Jacksons and Grahams, as is the manner of their kind. Even Gervase, it must be allowed, got a great deal of entertainment out of the furnishing, notwithstanding the various cares which lay upon his heart. He had made all possible inquiries, it need scarcely be said, at once at the bank to endeavour to trace the money--but in vain; and he had set on foot all the researches that were practicable to find some trace of his father. But it would seem, though it is a theory rather against modern notions, that it is more easy for a man to disappear than for the most experienced pursuers to find him. He was asked for over half America, which is a big word; he was sought in Australia; the foreign baths and watering-places, where it was so very unlikely such a man should go, were ransacked for him: but no trace, not so much as a footprint, anywhere could be found. He had disappeared as criminals often do, and innocent people sometimes, and after a long period of ineffectual exertions, the pursuit was given up. Whether Gilbert, the man left in charge of the house, knew anything, Gervase never could find out; but if he did, he was proof against all inducements to speak, and never betrayed his old master.