“He may be alive,” said Wilding.  “And if he is alive, have I not—­innocently, I grant you innocently—­robbed him of enough?  Have I not robbed him of all the happy time that I enjoyed in his stead?  Have I not robbed him of the exquisite delight that filled my soul when that dear lady,” stretching his hand towards the picture, “told me she was my mother?  Have I not robbed him of all the care she lavished on me?  Have I not even robbed him of all the devotion and duty that I so proudly gave to her?  Therefore it is that I ask myself, George Vendale, and I ask you, where is he?  What has become of him?”

“Who can tell!”

“I must try to find out who can tell.  I must institute inquiries.  I must never desist from prosecuting inquiries.  I will live upon the interest of my share—­I ought to say his share—­in this business, and will lay up the rest for him.  When I find him, I may perhaps throw myself upon his generosity; but I will yield up all to him.  I will, I swear.  As I loved and honoured her,” said Wilding, reverently kissing his hand towards the picture, and then covering his eyes with it.  “As I loved and honoured her, and have a world of reasons to be grateful to her!” And so broke down again.

His partner rose from the chair he had occupied, and stood beside him with a hand softly laid upon his shoulder.  “Walter, I knew you before to-day to be an upright man, with a pure conscience and a fine heart.  It is very fortunate for me that I have the privilege to travel on in life so near to so trustworthy a man.  I am thankful for it.  Use me as your right hand, and rely upon me to the death.  Don’t think the worse of me if I protest to you that my uppermost feeling at present is a confused, you may call it an unreasonable, one.  I feel far more pity for the lady and for you, because you did not stand in your supposed relations, than I can feel for the unknown man (if he ever became a man), because he was unconsciously displaced.  You have done well in sending for Mr. Bintrey.  What I think will be a part of his advice, I know is the whole of mine.  Do not move a step in this serious matter precipitately.  The secret must be kept among us with great strictness, for to part with it lightly would be to invite fraudulent claims, to encourage a host of knaves, to let loose a flood of perjury and plotting.  I have no more to say now, Walter, than to remind you that you sold me a share in your business, expressly to save yourself from more work than your present health is fit for, and that I bought it expressly to do work, and mean to do it.”

With these words, and a parting grip of his partner’s shoulder that gave them the best emphasis they could have had, George Vendale betook himself presently to the counting-house, and presently afterwards to the address of M. Jules Obenreizer.

As he turned into Soho Square, and directed his steps towards its north side, a deepened colour shot across his sun-browned face, which Wilding, if he had been a better observer, or had been less occupied with his own trouble, might have noticed when his partner read aloud a certain passage in their Swiss correspondent’s letter, which he had not read so distinctly as the rest.