“Is there any clew yet?”

Mr. Lamb shook his head sadly.

“Not a ray of light has been thrown on the mystery,” he replied, “though the best Scotland Yard men are at work.  You may depend upon it that the insurance people, who stand to lose ten thousand pounds, will leave no stone unturned.  As for Raper, our watchman, he has been discharged.  Mr. Drummond and I are convinced that his story was true, but it was impossible to overlook his gross carelessness.  We never knew that he was in the habit of going nightly to the public house in Crown Court.”

“It’s a wonder you were not robbed before,” said Jack.  “You have my address—­will you let me know if anything occurs?”

“Certainly, Mr. Vernon.  Must you be off?  Good morning!”

Jack sauntered along Pall Mall, and turned up Regent street.  At Piccadilly Circus he saw two men standing before the cigar shop on the corner.  One was young and boyish looking.  The other, a few years older, was of medium height and stout beyond proportion; he wore a tweed suit of a rather big check pattern, and the coat was buttoned over a scarlet waistcoat; the straw hat, gaudily beribboned, shaded a fat, jolly, half-comical face, of the type that readily inspires confidence.  He was talking to his companion animatedly when he saw Jack approaching.  With a boisterous exclamation of delight he rushed up to him and clapped him on the shoulder.

“Clare, old boy!” he cried.

“Jimmie Drexell!” Jack gasped in amazement.  “Dear old chap, how awfully glad I am to see you!”

With genuine and heartfelt emotion they shook hands and looked into each other’s eyes—­these two who had not met for long years, since the rollicksome days of student life in Paris when they had been as intimate as brothers.

“You’re fit as a king, my boy—­not much changed,” spluttered Drexell, with a strong American accent to his kindly, mellow voice.  “I was going to look you up to-day—­only landed at Southampton yesterday—­got beastly tired of New York—­yearned for London and Paris—­shan’t go back for six months or a year, hanged if I do.”

“I’m jolly glad to hear it, Jimmie.”

“We’ll see a lot of each other—­eh, old man?  So, you’ve stuck to the name of Vernon?  I called you Clare, didn’t I?  Yes, I forgot.  You told me you had taken the other name when you wrote a couple of years ago.  I haven’t heard from you since, except through the papers.  You’ve made a hit, I understand.  Doing well?”

“Rather!  I’ve no cause to complain.  And you, Jimmie?  What’s become of the art?”

“Chucked it, Jack—­it was no go.  I painted like a blooming Turk—­hired a studio—­filled it with jimcrackery—­got the best-looking models—­wore a velvet coat and grew long hair.  But it was all useless.  I earned twenty-five dollars in three years.  I had a picture in a dealer’s shop—­his place burnt down—­I made him fork over.  Then a deceased relative left me $150,000—­said I deserved it for working so hard in Paris.  A good one, eh?  I leased the studio to the Salvation Army, and here I am, a poor devil of an artist out of work.”