I recollected his words as I sat on the top of the tram passing up those long broad roads lit by the flare of costermongers' lights and rendered noisy by the strident cries of the butchers and greengrocers shouting their wares. In South London commercial life seems to commence with the sundown, for thrifty working-class housewives go out shopping after dark. And Tibbie, the woman whom all smart London knew, who was so brilliant a figure at receptions, balls and weddings, and of whose beauty the ladies' papers so constantly spoke, was living amid that poverty and squalor alone, terrified and crying her heart out. For what? Had remorse seized her? Was it the awful recollection of that fatal moment in Charlton Wood, combined with the constant fear that Ellice Winsloe, whom she had now acknowledged as her enemy, would discover her and bring against her the terrible charge? That night, after I had slipped unrecognised into my chambers, I changed quickly into my own clothes and went along to the Wellington Club to find Domville. The hall-porter had not, however, seen him that day; therefore, after strolling through the rooms, I was just on the point of leaving when, in the hall, I encountered Ellice Winsloe. "Hulloa! old fellow!" he cried cheerily. "What are you doing to-night? Come along and dine with me at Boodle's." I hesitated. I had no wish for the company of the man who was Tibbie's secret enemy. Once I had distrusted him; now I hated him, for I saw how ingeniously he had kept observation upon my movements, and how his invitation, so warmly given, was with the ulterior object of ascertaining my movements. In an instant it occurred to me that I might fight him with his own weapons. I could be as alert as he was. Therefore, I laughed and declared that I had no prior engagement. "Come along, then," he said; and we both went out and crossed Hyde Park corner together. "I was at the Wydcombes this afternoon. It was Lady Wydcombe's day. They're till most anxious about Tibbie. Nobody knows where she is," he added, with a covert glance at my countenance to watch the effect of his words. "Yes," I said, "she's certainly a bit erratic. I hear, however, that she has written to her mother saying that she's all right." "The police think the letter was written under compulsion. Jack took it to Scotland Yard, with the result that the Criminal Investigation Department have redoubled their efforts to trace her. What's your opinion?" I shrugged my shoulders. The fellow's object was to get me to talk; but I knew how to be silent when it suited me, and was determined to tell him nothing. "Old Lady Scarcliff is very upset, I hear," he went on as we walked along Piccadilly to St James's Street.