“I’ll leave you, then.”

“Yes. But let us know the moment any news comes through.”

“Ay; I’ll do that all right, never fear.”

Bowes left them; and they settled down to try to get a few hours’ badly needed sleep. In somewhat incongruous positions, Henry Fairhurst curled up like a small boy in a huge leather arm-chair, Cunningham with his feet stretched before the fire, his bulky body compressed within the confining arms of another chair, and Shelley on the couch, his feet hanging over the arm at one end and his head over the other. In spite of all these handicaps, however, they managed to get a little sleep, even though it was somewhat disturbed slumber.

Then Shelley woke suddenly, shaking himself with surprise and gazing around him with a puzzled frown. The effort of realising precisely where he was had, at first, been too much for him; but he soon came to his senses, and made up his mind what had happened. But what had wakened him? He looked up and saw Henry Fairhurst, the stubble of twenty-four hours’ growth looking strangely out of place on his usually immaculate chin. Henry had gripped Shelley by the shoulder and was shaking him vigorously.

“What’s the matter?” Shelley asked sleepily.

“Are you awake, Mr. Shelley?”

“Yes. What’s the matter?”

“I’ve remembered something important.”

“Important? What about?”

“About Wallace’s house.”

“Wallace’s house? In Penistone?”

“Yes.”

Shelley struggled into an upright position, rubbed his eyes with a gesture curiously reminiscent of a sleepy child, and looked Henry Fairhurst straight in the face. At last he was fully awake, and prepared to receive whatever this important information might be.

“What is it you’ve remembered?” he asked briskly. “Shoot!”

“I have been lying awake,” answered Mr. Fairhurst, “and trying to recall the name of the house.”

“So you did know the name of the house once?”

“Naturally. Wallace wrote to me from there when he asked me to come down for the week-end that time.”

“Good. And could you remember it?” Shelley wished with all his heart that Henry would come to the point a little more quickly, and would not so “beat about the bush.”

“I’ve only got the vaguest memory,” answered Henry. “All that I can remember is that ‘Black’ came somewhere in it.”

“Black?” Shelley was puzzled again.

“Yes. It may have been called Black House, or Black Manor, or even Black Farm.”

Shelley looked thoughtful. “That all you can remember about it?” he asked.

Henry was very apologetic. “I’m afraid it is,” he admitted.

“H’m. Might be helpful or might not,” Shelley announced. “Still, there’s only one way to be sure. We must ask Bowes if he knows of anywhere in or near Penistone that is called Black something.”

“It might even be Black-something House,” suggested Henry, not particularly helpfully. Shelley snorted.