“He has got to go through with it, Dick,” he said. “If you get him out of this trouble he’ll probably get into worse. The poor little girl – I’m sorry for her. Of course you’re speaking about Gine? No, no, you needn’t be afraid, I shan’t say a word. But I’ve had my suspicions for a long time. Let him take his medicine, Dick, and do what you can for the girl. Once that fellow is behind bars and the whole wretched trouble is at an end, come to me for any money you want – for the girl. I knew her father and her uncle, and the great-uncle who left her a lot of money, which I suppose has gone up in smoke with the rest, and I’m willing to go a long way to help her. But you mustn’t pledge your credit, Dick, for that worthless man.”

Dick came away from the City weary and sick at heart, too dispirited even to interview the fourth man he had intended seeing. His only hope now was his brother, and he knew Harry’s obstinacy too well to expect help from that quarter, which could not even be asked for, except by betraying as the borrower the man for whom he had conceived an unreasoning hatred.

Monkey Puttler met him at the station, and had a piece of news to impart.

“That bird Thomas is still in the neighbourhood,” he said. “He’s been living in Gilder’s cottage.”

“Indeed?” said Dick. He was really not concerned with Thomas or Gilder or anything in the wide world except the heartbreak that awaited Leslie Gine.

“Gilder’s been down today. Ascot’s all over, isn’t it? Anyway, he was dressed like a doctor in new clothes – top hat and everything.”

“Where has he been?” asked Dick, with sudden interest.

“I don’t know. I guess he went to call on Mr Gine. I saw his car coming out of the drive, and he looked very pleased with himself. And I’ve found the rifle.”

“Where did you find it?” asked Dick quickly.

“Up against the river. Someone must have thrown it in, but didn’t throw hard enough. There were three or four cartridges still in the magazine – a sporting Lee-Enfield. They’ve tried the knife and they’ve tried the gun; I wonder what new one they’ll put out on us.”

“Have you seen Harry?”

“Saw him this afternoon,” said the cheerful Puttler. “He worked that chesil gag on me, but I didn’t give him my views.”

In spite of his anxiety, Dick smiled.

“Have you any views on chesils?”

“Yes, sir,” said the other confidently. “He thinks chesil is an instrument. He doesn’t seem to realise that in Elizabethan times ‘chesil’ meant ‘gravel’ or ‘shingle.’”

Dick stopped and stared at him.

“Is that so?” he asked.