"It's a forlorn hope," said Macandrew, hesitating, "and risky. Still----" He looked questioningly at Arnold. The little man nodded sadly. "Things are so bad that they can scarcely be worse," he remarked, "and certainly, as Mr. Haskins thinks, a public trial would force the witnesses we want into court. Once in the box, and closely examined, the truth might come to light. I think Mr. Haskins should do as he says, but--it is a risk." "Life is all risks," said Gerald cheerfully. "Well, I am going to pack up and clear off to London. And you, Toddy?" "I shall keep my eye on Geary, and, if possible, I shall see Mrs. Crosbie, or her mother." Gerald nodded, and, matters thus being arranged, he went up to London that same afternoon, _en route_ for Southend, there to make Mavis his wife. Tod and Arnold, left behind, remained at the Prince's Hotel, and wandered about the country, even as far as Leegarth. They heard that the London ladies were still with the Major, but did not catch a glimpse of them. And even Tod, audacious as he was, shrank from going to the Pixy's House and openly accusing the lively widow. Tod took occasion to pay a special visit to the Devon Maid, and found the hotel in charge of a rough man and his slatternly wife. It appeared that since Mrs. Geary's disappearance her husband had taken heavily to drink, and refused to attend to his business. His uncivilized instincts had got the better of him, and he was running wild in the neighborhood. Mrs. Geary, now with her mother in Barnstaple, refused to return to him, or to surrender her children, and Adonis talked loudly of forcing her stubborn will by law. But, as yet, he had not done anything, perhaps because he was in danger of the law himself. Tod learned as much from Inspector Morgan, whom he met in the Silbury High Street on the third day after Gerald's departure in search of a wife. In the course of an idle conversation about this, that, and the other thing--for Macandrew, during his holiday at the Devon Maid, had learned to know Morgan intimately--the name of the negro was mentioned, and the inspector uttered a grunt. "He's a black scoundrel, that," he remarked. "Why?" asked Tod, pricking up his ears. "I always understood that Geary was a meritorious inhabitant of Denleigh. He certainly conducted the Devon Maid well, as I stopped there myself. You know that?" Morgan nodded. "Things have changed since you and Mr. Haskins were there, sir," he said slowly. "It was Mrs. Geary who kept the inn respectable, and a miserable life she had with that sooty blackguard. But she got fed up with his brutality, and went back to her mother in Barnstaple. Since then the inn has gone from bad to worse, and Geary is drinking." "I heard something of this," observed Tod. "Why don't you pull him up?"