“Oh! Colonel Piercey, if you’d but look up Mr. Gervase for my lady?--she can’t neither die nor get better till she sees her boy,” said the weeping Parsons; and “Colonel Piercey, Sir,” said Dunning, “Sir Giles do look to you so, as he never looked to any gentleman before. I’ll get him to do whatever’s right and good for him if so be as he knows you’re here.” Thus, both master and servants seized upon him. And yet what could he do? He could not go out and search for Gervase whom he had never seen, knowing absolutely nothing of his cousin’s haunts, nor of the people among whom he was likely to be. And he could not consult the servants on this point. There was but one person who could give him information, and she kept out of his way. On the evening of the second day, however, Margaret came into the library after Sir Giles had been wheeled off to bed. It happened that Colonel Piercey was standing before the writing-table, examining that very photograph which he had discovered with such surprise, and which had made him break off so quickly in his story on the night when Lady Piercey was taken ill. She came suddenly up to him where he stood with the photograph, and laid her hand on his arm. He had not heard her step, and started, almost dropping it in his surprise. “Mrs. Osborne!” he exclaimed. “You are looking at Gervase’s picture? Cousin Gerald, help us if you can. I don’t know how much or how little she feels, but it is Gervase my aunt is lying looking for--Gervase, who doesn’t know she is ill even if he had the thought. Was it him you saw with--with the woman? I have not liked to ask you, but I can’t put it off any longer. Was it Gervase? Oh! for pity’s sake, speak!” “How should I know,” he said, “if you don’t know?” “Know? I! What way have I of knowing? You saw him, or you seemed to think you did.” “It was only for a moment. I had never seen him before; I might be mistaken. It seemed to me that it was the same kind of face. But how can I speak on the glimpse of a moment? I might be quite wrong.” “You are very cautious,” she cried at last, “oh, very cautious!--though it is a matter of life and death. Won’t you help us, then, or can’t you help us? If this is so, it might give a clue. There is a girl--who has disappeared also, I have just found out. Oh! Cousin Gerald, you know what he is?--you must have heard enough to know: not a madman, nor even an imbecile, yet not like other people. He might be imposed upon--he might be carried away. There was something strange about him before he went. He said things which I could not understand. But they suspected nothing.” “Was it not your duty,” said Gerald Piercey, almost sternly, “to tell them--if they suspected nothing, as you say?”