In the end, Hugh was compelled to agree that Sir Cedric had been right. He visited and questioned the chief officials of the city--the Prefects of the quarters, the Senators and Judges, the commanders of the municipal police; the Patriarch and the lesser clergy; the monks in charge of the rest-house maintained by the Hospitallers, where Crusaders journeying to and from the Holy Land were wont to stay; the officials in charge of the Posts; the asylums and hospitals. Nowhere did he find a hint of evidence to go upon. As Sir Cedric had warned him was probable, he did not even find a single person who professed to having seen his father in Constantinople, seven years before last mid-Lent. He had run up against a blank wall. And to add to his disappointment he was constrained to the belief that his worst fears about Edith had been realised. He saw her frequently after their first meeting in the Hall of Audience, but they never came any nearer to their old footing. She was capricious, contemptuous, aloof, spontaneously friendly, mischievous, domineering and patronising by turns, but she was never the good comrade of the days in Crowden Wood. It almost seemed to Hugh that she feared he might demand a return to their former comradeship, and in his stubborn pride he adopted an attitude more unyielding than her own. Yet it puzzled him that she should constantly be twitting him on his knight-errantry for Helena Comnena. The daughter of the Cæsar shared with Edith the attention of the varied Court that grew up about the Young Alexius, who, by reason of his father's infirmity, became the governing force of the Empire. They formed a startling contrast, the dark beauty and the fair; and each had her circle of admirers. When Edith frowned, Helena smiled; and more than once Hugh asked himself why he declined to develop a friendship proffered so openly as Helena's. But some instinct taught him to beware the subtly passionate advances of the Greek. He would have been miserable, indeed, had it not been for the staunch devotion of Matteo, and the rapid progress of developments which permitted no man to mope over his own troubles. When he had satisfied himself that his search for his father was unavailing, and he was convinced that Edith would have none of him, he made up his mind to push on ahead of the host to Palestine, intending to make inquiry of the Saracens if they knew aught of his father's fate. He was aware that this was a line of investigation which had been worked unsuccessfully hitherto, but in his unsettled state he was eager for anything which promised action. But Villehardouin, to whom he broached his project, persuaded him to remain.