"It's all right, Mr. Pickard," he remarked reassuringly. "This gentleman is here on just the same business--whatever you say will be treated as confidential--it'll go no further. You've something to tell about my late clerk, James Parrawhite." Pickard, who had been nervously fingering a white billycock hat, now put it down on the floor and thrust his hands into the pockets of his trousers as if to keep them safe while he talked. "It's like this here," he answered. "When I saw that there advertisement in the paper this mornin', says I to my missus, 'I'll away,' I says, 'an' see Lawyer Eldrick about that there, this very day!' 'Cause you see, Mr. Eldrick, there is summat as I can tell about yon man 'at you mention--James Parrawhite. I've said nowt about it to nobody, up to now, 'cause it were private business atween him and me, as it were, but I lost money over it, and of course, ten pound is ten pound, gentlemen." "Quite so," agreed Eldrick, "And you shall have your ten pounds if you can tell anything useful." "I don't know owt about it's being useful, sir, nor what use is to be made on it," said Pickard, "but I can tell you a bit o' truth, and you can do what you like wi' what I tell. But," he went on, lowering his voice and glancing at the door by which he had just entered, "there's another name 'at 'll have to be browt in--private, like. Name, as it so happens, o' one o' your clerks--t' head clerk, I'm given to understand--Mr. Pratt." Eldrick showed no sign of surprise. But he continued to look significantly at Byner as he turned to the landlord. "Mr. Pratt has left me," he said. "Left me three weeks ago. So you needn't be afraid, Mr. Pickard--say anything you like." "Oh, I didn't know," remarked Pickard. "It's not oft that I come down in t' town, and we don't hear much Barford news up our way. Well, it's this here, Mr. Eldrick--you know where my place is, of course?" Eldrick nodded, and turned to Byner. "I'd better explain to you," he said. "Whitcliffe is an outlying part of the town, well up the hills--a sort of wayside hamlet with a lot of our famous stone quarries in its vicinity. The _Green Man_, of which our friend here is the landlord, is an old-fashioned tavern by the roadside--where people are rather fond of dropping in on a Sunday, I fancy, eh, Mr. Pickard?"