Mr. Wedderburn rushed to Portobello as fast as the train would take him, following in the track of his young clerk, who had already exhausted every means of information, but who fortunately met the lawyer on the way and gave him the result of his inquiries. These inquiries seemed to leave no doubt as to the catastrophe, and Wedderburn found to his horror that it was already very generally known, and that there had been a paragraph on the subject in the _Scotsman_, fortunately not giving the name of the sufferer, but indicating the general fear that a well-known member of society had been the victim. “They never read the papers,” Mr. Wedderburn said to himself, “and she would never think it was--_him_” (already it seemed too familiar to say Bob). When some one came hurrying up to him, grasping his hand and asking, “Is this awful news true?--is it out of doubt that it’s poor D’yell?”--the broken-hearted man felt once more fiercely angry at the question, as if it was not a thing to be discussed in ordinary words. But this was morbid, he knew. The questioner was Mr. Scrymgeour, Fred’s host, the giver of the ball on the previous night, who explained that he had seen the paragraph in the papers, and had secured it at once and come in to Edinburgh to inquire, that the poor boy should hear nothing till he could ascertain if it were true. And even while he spoke, others came pressing upon them with grave faces: “Was it true? Could it be D’yell?” The sensation was extraordinary. “He was said to be a little shaky in business matters,” said one. “That was all rubbish,” said another. “A man with a good estate at his back and plenty of friends--no fear but he would have pulled through.” “And Chili stock is looking up again, which was supposed to be his danger.” Thus they stood and talked him over. “I suppose there is no doubt it was an accident?” said another cautiously. This remark caught the lawyer’s anxious ear, upon whose own heart a heavy cloud of dread was hanging. But there was a chorus (thank God!) of assurances. No, no!--Bob D’yell was the best fellow in the world. He was a man always confident in his own mind, a man that had every inducement to live--with a fine family, his son at Oxford, with a good estate behind him, and an excellent character and plenty of friends. Even if there might be a little temporary embarrassment--that would soon have blown over. There were men that would have stuck by him through thick and thin. “Me, for instance,” said Mr. Wedderburn, careless of grammar. “I went out especially last night to tell him, if there really was trouble, I would see him through it----” “Poor fellow! Poor Bob! Poor D’yell!” the bystanders said in their various tones. Nobody had the faintest hope that he could have escaped. Such a prodigy as a man without clothes would soon have been known along the coast. And of course he would have hurried back, if he had been saved, to ease the anxieties of his friends. It was only Mr.