"I have no doubt that it will come to his being examined on a great many points and in much detail," said Mr. Carless with a dry smile. "Of course, I shall be much interested in seeing him. You see, I remember the missing Lord Marketstoke very well indeed--he was often in here when I, as a lad of nineteen or twenty, was articled to my own father. And now, gentlemen, I'll ask you a question and commend it to your intelligence and common sense: if your client is this man he claims to be, why didn't he come straight to Carless and Driver, whom he would remember well enough, instead of going to Methley and Woodlesford? Come, now?" Neither visitor answered this question, and Mr. Pawle suddenly turned on them with another. "Did your client mention to you that he knew Carless and Driver as the family solicitors?" he asked. "No, I can't say that he did," admitted Methley. "After all, thirty-five years' absence, you know--" "You said just now that his memory was surprisingly fresh," interrupted Mr. Pawle. "Surely," replied Woodlesford, "surely you can't expect a man who has been away from England all that time to remember everything!" "I should have expected Lord Marketstoke to have gone straight to the family solicitors, anyway," retorted Mr. Pawle. "Obvious thing to do--if his story is a true one." Woodlesford glanced at his partner, and repossessing himself of the documents, began to arrange them in the envelope from which he had drawn them. "We cannot, of course, say positively who our client is or who he is not," he said. "All we can say is that he came to us with an introduction from an old client of ours whom we knew very well, and that his story seems to us to be quite credible. No doubt he can bring further proof. That he did not come here in the first instance--" "I'll tell you why I, personally, am very much surprised that he didn't," interrupted Mr. Carless. "You told Lord Ellingham yesterday that your client saw no end of advertisements for him at the time of his father's death. Now, we, Carless and Driver, sent out those advertisements--our name was appended to every one of them, wherever they appeared. Why, then, when this man--if he is the real man--returned home, did he not come to us? For there are three persons in this office who--but wait!" He touched a bell; the clerk who had announced Methley and Woodlesford put his head in at the door. "Ask Mr. Portlethwaite to come here," commanded Mr. Carless. "And just find out if Mr. Driver is in his room. Portlethwaite can tell me when he comes." An elderly, grey-haired man presently appeared and closed the door behind him as if aware of the sacred nature of the proceedings. "Mr. Driver is out, Mr. Carless," he said. "You wanted me, I think?" "Our senior clerk," observed Mr. Carless, by way of introduction. "Portlethwaite, you remember the Lord Marketstoke who disappeared some thirty-five years ago?" Mr. Portlethwaite smiled.