That was seven o’clock in the evening.  He dined an hour later, and when it was dark left the house.  Between then and midnight he was constantly in and out, and Mrs. Jenkins, who was kept up by her fears that ‘t’ master’ was seriously unwell, made at length another attempt to face him.  She knocked at the door of the sitting-room, having heard him enter a minute or two before; no answer was vouchsafed, so she made bold to open the door.  Dagworthy was sitting with his head upon the table, his arms stretched out; he appeared to be asleep.

‘Mr. Richard!’ she said softly.  ‘Mr. Richard!’

He looked up.  ‘Well?  What is it?’

‘Yo’ scahr’d me; ah thowt summat ‘ad come to yo’.  What’s wrong wi’ yo’, Mr. Richard?  You look as if you could hardly he’d your heead up.’

To her surprise he spoke quite calmly.

’Yes, I’ve got a bit of a headache.  Get me some hot water, will you?  I’ll have some brandy and go to bed.’

She began to advise other remedies, but Dagworthy speedily checked her.

’Get me some hot water, I tell you, and go to bed yourself.  What are you doing up at this hour?’

He went to business at the usual time next morning, and it seemed as if the worst had blown over; at home he was sullen, but not violent.

The third day after his return, on entering his office at the mill, he found Hood taking down one of a row of old ledgers which stood there upon a shelf.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked abruptly, at the same time turning his back upon the clerk.

Hood explained that he was under the necessity of searching through the accounts for several years, to throw light upon a certain transaction which was giving trouble.

‘All right,’ was the reply, as Dagworthy took his keys out to open his desk.

A quarter of an hour later, he entered the room where Hood was busy over the ledger.  A second clerk was seated there, and him Dagworthy summoned to the office, where he had need of him.  Presently Hood came to replace the ledger he had examined, and took away the succeeding volume.  A few minutes later Dagworthy said to the clerk who sat with him—­

’I shall have to go away for an hour or so.  I’m expecting a telegram from Legge Brothers; if it doesn’t come before twelve o’clock, you or Hood must go to Hebsworth.  It had better be Hood; you finish what you’re at.  If there’s no telegram, he must take the twelve-thirteen, and give this note here to Mr. Andrew Legge; there’ll be an answer.  Mind you see to this.’

At the moment when Dagworthy’s tread sounded on the stairs, Mr. Hood was on the point of making a singular discovery.  In turning a page of the ledger, he came upon an envelope, old and yellow, which had evidently been shut up in the hook for several years; it was without address and unsealed.  He was going to lay it aside, when his fingers told him that it contained something; the enclosure proved to be a ten-pound note, also old and patched together in the manner of notes that have been sent half at a time.