“Allen left enough money to provide his daughters with about a hundred a year each; this was to be theirs absolutely when they came of age, or when they married.  The will had been carefully drawn up, and provided against all sorts of real and imaginary dangers.  The one thing it couldn’t provide against was the imbecility of the old aunt, who still had the girls in her care.

“A couple of years went by, and Lilian became a teacher in the school she had attended.  Do you know anything about Bristol and the neighbourhood?  It seems that the people there are in the habit of going to a place called Weston-super-Mare—­excursion steamers, and so on.  Well, the girls and their aunt went to spend a day at Weston, and on the boat they somehow made acquaintance with a young man named Northway.  That means, of course, he made up to them, and the aunt was idiot enough to let him keep talking.  He stuck by them all day, and accompanied them back to Bristol.—­Pah! it sickens me to tell the story!”

He took the glass to drink, but it slipped from his nervous fingers and crashed on the ground.

“Never mind; let it be there.  I have had whisky enough.  This damned fellow Northway soon called upon them, and was allowed to come as often as he liked.  He was a clerk in a commercial house—­gave references which were found to be satisfactory enough, a great talker, and of course a consummate liar.  His special interest was the condition of the lower classes; he made speeches here and there, went slumming, called himself a Christian Socialist.  This kind of thing was no doubt attractive to Lilian—­you know enough of her to understand that.  She was a girl of seventeen, remember.  In the end, Northway asked her to marry him, and she consented.”

“Did he know of the money?” inquired Glazzard.

“Undoubtedly.  I shouldn’t wonder if the blockhead aunt told.  Well, the wedding-day came; they were married; and—­just as they came out of the church, up walks a detective, claps his hand on Northway’s shoulder, and arrests him for forgery.”

“H’m!  I see.”

“The fellow was tried.  Lilian wouldn’t tell me the details; she gave me an old newspaper with full report.  Northway had already, some years before, been in the hands of the police in London.  It came out now that he was keeping a mistress; on the eve of marriage he had dispensed with her services, and the woman, in revenge, went to his employers to let them know certain suspicious facts.  He was sent to penal servitude for three years.”

“Three years!” murmured Glazzard.  “About so ago, I suppose?”

“Yes; perhaps he is already restored to society.  Pleasant reflection!”

“Moral and discreet law,” remarked the other, “which maintains the validity of such a marriage!”

Denzil uttered a few violent oaths, reminiscences of the Navy.

“And she went at once to Sweden?” Glazzard inquired.