And, having an eye on the clock, Walker, junior, bounced out, apparently in high dudgeon; but really well pleased with his own Machiavellian skill. Indeed, judged solely from a standard of evil-doing, he had been most successful. He knew well that Banks would go straight to the local superintendent of police, ostensibly for further information, but in reality to carry the great news, and set in motion the official mill which would grind out additional installments. But Walker's masterstroke lay with Dobb, who, in a sense, represented Mrs. Garth and her daughter. If Dobb could be brought to appreciate the gravity of the girl's statements anent her father--and his reception of Walker's story showed that he was prepared to treat it seriously--he would either write to Meg, asking her to visit Nuttonby, or go himself to Elmdale. In either event, she would be crushed into the dust. The elderly and trustworthy solicitor's testimony would carry weight. She could no longer deny that Stephen Garth was reputedly in his grave; she would be faced with the alternative that her father was an adroit criminal of the worst type, because public opinion invariably condemns a smug rogue far more heavily than the ne'er-do-well, who seems to be branded for the gallows from birth. Yet, by operation of the law that it is the unexpected that happens, James Walker, the second, was fated not to retire for a night's well-earned and much-needed repose with a mind wholly freed from anxiety. This came about in a peculiar way. By Mrs. Garth's request, soon after her departure from Elmdale, the solicitor invariably addressed her as Mrs. Ogilvey. At last, the notion got embedded in Mr. Dobb's mind that she had undoubtedly quarreled with her husband long before the latter committed suicide, and that the outcome of Garth's death was her speedy remarriage! From his recollection of her, she was certainly not the sort of woman whom he would credit with such a callous proceeding, but no man can spend a lifetime in a lawyer's office without gaining an insight into strange by-ways of human nature. The profession necessitates a close knowledge of the hidden lives and recondite actions of scores of one's fellow-creatures. Mr. Dobb knew a vicar who had committed bigamy, and a county magistrate who had been a petty thief for years before he was caught. That Mrs. Garth should marry again within a few weeks of her husband's burial might indeed be strange, but it sank into a commonplace category in comparison with other queer events he could name. Behold, then, young James arriving at The Beeches--a charming old house situated on the outskirts of Nuttonby; the "nut," as was becoming, was attired in a nut-brown suit, black shoes, a brown Homburg hat, socks and tie to match a shirt with heliotrope stripes, and yellow gloves.