“I understand that you know of a great sum of money that is coming to Maurice Darley.  It’s strange, very strange.”

“Why is it?  Did you know anything about it?  Did you expect it?”

There was a note of alarm in Sydney’s tones.

“No, not that in particular.  But you must tell me all the details before I dare to tell any more.”

The old lady seated herself on a low chair close to Sydney’s side.  It was extremely weird, this confidential talk in the darkness.

“What details do you want?” Sydney asked.

“Why, proofs that there is really something to this fortune.  Maurice has talked too much about others that have nothing to them.”

“You see him often, then,” exclaimed Sydney eagerly.  “He’s here, perhaps.”

“S’h!” commanded the old Lady in a stern whisper.  “Yes, he is here.  He is in the back room yonder.  I am so afraid he will hear us.  That is why I had you come at midnight, when he would be sound asleep.”

“But why can I not see him?”

“Because he is weak—­ weak in his mind.  He is all the while fancying that he is rich.  A talk about money would excite him so that I fear the consequences.”

“And you say he knew Mr. Tyler?” Sydney remembered and spoke this name very softly.

“Yes, he talks of him continually now.”

“Was he in his office once?”

“Yes, I believe so.”

“One more question.  Has this Mr. Darley any children?”

“He had one once—­ a boy.  But it must have died when a baby, soon after Mrs. Darley did.  And now do you know why I do not want you to come here with stories of riches for Maurice Darley?  He’s daft on the subject already.  I do not want him to go so far that they will take him away from me.”

“You are fond of him, then?” asked Sydney.

“He is all I have.  If he goes I must live alone.  It is my delight to care for him.  The little money David left me is enough for my simple wants, Maurice lives like a lord in his fancies.  Why do you want to come and disturb us in our content?”

“Because I must,” Sydney broke out, as passionately as he could in restrained tones.  “Don’t you understand that the money which belongs to Maurice Darley I have been diverting to other uses?  It was left to him by Mr. Tyler, but I tore up the will.  He made it about three hours after another one, in which he had left everything to the woman who had acted as a mother to me for twenty years.

“He was a vacillating old man.  I felt that he might change his mind back again if he should live three hours longer, so when he was dead I tore up the last will.  I alone knew what it contained, and I have been a miserable man ever since.”

Sydney bowed his head on his hands, and there was silence in the little room for a moment or two.

“You—­ you are a criminal, then?” said the old lady presently.

Sydney winced at the term, but at the same time he felt a sense of relief, as one does after taking a plunge into cold water.  At any rate the shock of the first contact was over.