irritable individual (gout had him by the heels at the time), who was as full of “yaps” and snarls as any Irish terrier, and as peevish and fussy as a fault-finding old woman.  Added to this, he had a way of glancing all round the room, and avoiding the eye of the person to whom he was talking.  And if Cleek had been like the generality of people, and hadn’t known that some of the best and “straightest” men in the world have been afflicted in this manner, and some of the worst and “crookedest” could look you straight in the eyes without turning a hair, he might have taken this for a bad sign.  Then, too, he seemed to have a great many more wrappings and swaddlings about his gouty foot than appeared to be necessary—­unless it was done to make his helpless state very apparent, and to carry out his assertion that he hadn’t been able to walk a foot unassisted for the past week, and could not, therefore, be in any way connected with young Carboys’ mysterious vanishment.  Still, even that had its contra aspect.  He might be one of those individuals who make a mountain out of a molehill of pain, and insist upon a dozen poultices where one would do.

But Cleek could not forget that, as Narkom had said, there was not the shadow of doubt that in the event of Carboys having died possessed of means, the Captain would be the heir-at-law by virtue of his kinship; and it is a great deal more satisfactory to be rich oneself than to be dependent upon the generosity of a rich son-in-law.  So, after adroitly exercising the “pump” upon other matters: 

“I suppose, Miss Morrison,” said Cleek in a casual off-hand sort of way, “you don’t happen to know if Mr. Carboys ever made a will, do you?  I am aware, from what Mr. Narkom has told me of his circumstances, that he really possessed nothing that would call for the execution of such a document; but young men have odd fancies sometimes—­particularly when they become engaged—­so it is just possible that he might have done such a thing; that there was a ring or something of that sort he wanted to make sure of your getting should anything happen to him.  Of course, it is an absurd suggestion, but—­”

“It is not so absurd as you think, Mr. Headland,” she interrupted.  “As it happens, Mr. Carboys did make a will.  But that was a very long time ago—­in fact, before he knew me, so my name did not figure in it at all.  He once told me of the circumstances connected with it.  It was executed when he was about three-and-twenty.  It appears that there were some personal trinkets, relics of his more prosperous days:  a set of jewelled waistcoat buttons, a scarf-pin, a few choice books and things like that, which he desired Mr. Van Nant to have in the event of his death (they were then going to the Orient, and times there were troublous); so he drew up a will, leaving everything that he might die possessed of to Mr. Van Nant, and left the paper with the latter’s solicitor when they bade good-bye to England.  So far as I know, that will still