'Just one word, Tatlow,' he said. 'I want to have a little talk with that lady of whom you spoke to me--she that lives at Hendon, and adopted the child. But, of course, I don't want to give my own name, or to let her have any hint of the object of my visit. What should you say, now, was the best line for me to take?' 'Charity, sir!' said Mr. Tatlow promptly; 'Mrs. Claxton goes in for that hot and heavy--so they told me down there; and if you were to go as the agent of a society and pitch a good tale, she'd be sure to see you.' 'Poor creature!' said Humphrey Statham to himself, after the detective had departed. 'Charity, eh?--they frequently do that, I believe. It is the only way in which any remnant of good that may be left in them can find vent. Well, I'll make my first appearance as agent for a charity to-morrow afternoon.' CHAPTER III. A CHECK. Mr. Calverley dead! The announcement, suddenly blurted out by the footman, so took Pauline by surprise that she literally staggered back two paces, and supported herself against the wall. Dead, on the very day, almost at the very hour when he had promised to meet her, when she had calculated on worming from him the secret which, once in her possession, she had intended to use as the means of extracting information about Tom Durham, and of putting her on to her fugitive husband's track. Dead! What was the meaning of it all? Was the mystery about this unknown man, this not-to-be-mentioned invisible partner, Claxton, of deeper importance than she had thought? Were Mr. Calverley, Claxton, and Tom Durham so intermixed with business transactions of such a nature that sooner than confess his connexion with them the senior partner had committed self-destruction? The thought flashed like lightning through Pauline's brain. But ere she had time to analyse it, the solemn voice of the footman repeated in its croaking tones: 'Mrs. Calverley wishes to see Madame Doo Turt as soon as possible.' 'Yes,' said Pauline in reply, 'I will go to Mrs. Calverley at once.' Past the range of hat-pegs, where the dead man's coats and hats still hung; past the little study, through the open door of which she saw a row of his boots standing in order against the wall, his umbrella and walking-stick in the corner, his folded gloves and clothes-brush laid out upon the table; up the heavily-carpeted stairs; past the closed drawing-room door, and on to Mrs. Calverley's bedroom, at the door of which she knocked. Bidden to come in, Pauline entered, and found the widow seated prim and upright, in a high-backed chair, before the fire. 'This is sad news, my dear friend,' commenced Pauline, in a sympathetic voice; 'this is a frightful calamity.' 'Yes,' said Mrs. Calverley coldly, 'it is very hard upon me, but not more than I have always expected. Mr. Calverley chose never to live in his own home, and he has finished by dying out of it.' 'I have heard no particulars,' said Pauline. 'Where did the sad event take place?'