Wayman?" he said. "And wouldn't you just dose me with a cup of drugged coffee, and cut off to ransack my hiding-place while I was lying helpless in your hospitable abode. That's the sort of thing you'd do, if I happened to be a born innocent, isn't it, Mr. Wayman? But you see I'm not a born innocent, so you won't get the chance of doing anything of the kind."

"Don't be a fool," returned Dennis Wayman, in a surly tone. "You'll please to remember that one half of Valentine Jernam's money belongs to me, and ought to have been in my possession long before this. I was an idiot to trust it in your keeping."

"You trusted it in my keeping because you were obliged to do so,"

answered Black Milsom, "and I owe you no gratitude for your confidence.

I happened to know a Jew who was willing to give cash for the notes and bills of exchange; and you trusted them to me because it was the only way to get them turned into cash."

The landlord of the 'Jolly Tar' nodded a surly assent to this rather cynical statement.

"I saw my friend the Jew, and made a very decent bargain," resumed Milsom. "I hid the money in a convenient place, intending to bring you your share at the earliest opportunity. I was lagged that very night, and had no chance of touching the cash after I had once stowed it away.

So, you see, it was no fault of mine that you didn't get the money."

"Humph!" muttered Mr. Wayman. "It has been rather hard lines for me to be kept out of it so long. And now you have come back, I suppose you can take me at once to the hiding place. I want money very badly just now."

"Do you?" said Thomas Milsom, with a sneer. "That's a complaint you're rather subject to, isn't it--the want of money? Now, as I've answered your questions, perhaps you'll answer mine. Has there been much stir down this way while I've been over the water?"

"Very little; things have been as dull as they well could be."

"Ah! so _you'll_ say, of course. Can you tell me whether any one has lived in my old place while my back has been turned?"

The landlord of the 'Jolly Tar' started with a gesture of alarm.

"It wasn't _there_ you hid the money, was it?" he asked, eagerly.

"Suppose it was, what then?"

"Why every farthing of it is lost. The place has been taken by a man, who has pulled the best part of it down, and rebuilt it. If you hid your money _there_, there's little chance of your ever seeing it again," said Wayman.

Black Milsom's dark face grew livid, as he started from his chair and dragged on the crater coat which he had taken off on entering the room.

"It would be like my luck to lose that money," he said; "it would be just like my luck. Come, Wayman. What are you staring at, man?" he cried impatiently. "Come."

"Where?"

"To my old place. You can tell me all about the changes at we go. I must see to this business at once."

The moon was shining over the masts and rigging in the Pool, and over the house-tops of Bermondsey and Wapping, as Black Milsom and his companion started on their way to the old house by the water.

They went, as on a former occasion, in that vehicle which Mr. Wayman called his trap; and as they drove along the lonely road, across the marshy flat by the river, Dennis Wayman told his companion what had happened in his absence.

"For a year the house stood empty," he said; "but at the end of that time an old sea-captain took a fancy to it because of the water about it, and the view of the Pool from the top windows. He bought it, and pulled it almost all to pieces, rebuilt it, and I doubt if there is any of the old house standing. He has made quite a smart little place of it. He's a queer old chap, this Cap'en Duncombe, I'm told, and rather a tough customer."

"I'll see the inside of his house, however tough he may be," answered Milsom, in a dogged tone. "If he's a tough customer, he'll find me a tougher. Has he got any family?"

"One daughter--as pretty a girl as you'll see within twenty miles of London!"

"Well, we'll go and have a look at his place to-night. We'd better put up your trap at the 'Pilot Boat.'"

Mr. Wayman assented to the wisdom of this arrangement. The "Pilot Boat"

was a dilapidated-looking, low-roofed little inn, where there were some tumble-down stables, which were more often inhabited by bloated grey water-rats than by horses. In these stables Mr. Wayman lodged his pony and vehicle, while he and Milsom walked on to the cottage.

"Why I shouldn't have known the place!" cried Milsom, as his companion pointed to the captain's habitation.

The transformation was, indeed, complete. The dismal dwelling, which had looked as if it were, in all truth, haunted by a ghost, had been changed into one of the smartest little cottages to be seen in the suburbs of eastern London.

The ditch had been narrowed and embanked, and two tiny rustic bridges, of fantastical wood-work, spanned its dark water. The dreary pollard-willows had vanished, and evergreens occupied their places. The black rushes had been exchanged for flowers. A trim little garden appeared where all had once been waste ground; and a flag-staff, with a bit of bunting, gave a naval aspect to the spot.

All was dark; not one glimmer of light to be seen in any of the windows.

The garden was secured by an iron gate, and surrounded by iron rails on all sides, except that nearest the river. Here, the only boundary was a hedge of laurels, which were still low and thin; and here Dennis Wayman and his companion found easy access to the neatly-kept pleasure-ground.

With stealthy footsteps they invaded Captain Duncombe's little domain, and walked slowly round the house, examining every door and window as they went.

"Is the captain a rich man?" asked Milsom.

"Yes; I believe he's pretty well off--some say uncommonly well off. He spent over a thousand pounds on this place."

"Curse him for his pains!" returned Black Milsom, savagely. "He knows how to take care of his property. It would be a very clever burglar that would get into that house. The windows are all secured with outside shutters, that seem as solid as if they were made of iron, and the doors don't yield the twentieth part of an inch."

Then, after completing his examination of the house, Milsom exclaimed, in the same savage tone--

"Why, the man has swept away every timber of the place I lived in."

"I told you as much," answered Wayman; "I've heard say there was nothing left of old Screwton's house but a few solid timbers and a stack of chimneys."

Screwton was the name of the miser whose ghost had been supposed to haunt the old place.

Black Milsom gave a start as Dennis uttered the words "stack of chimneys."

"Oh!" he said, in an altered tone; "so they left the chimney-stack, did they?"

Mr. Wayman perceived that change of tone.

"I begin to understand," he said; "you hid that money in one of the chimneys."

"Never you mind where I hid it. There's little chance of its being found there, after bricklayers pulling the place to pieces. I must get into that house, come what may."

"You'll find that difficult," answered Wayman.

"Perhaps. But I'll do it, or my name's not Black Milsom."

Captain Joseph Duncombe, or Joe Duncombe, as he generally called himself, was a burly, rosy-faced man of fifty years of age; a hearty, honest fellow. He was a widower, with only one child, a daughter, whom he idolized.

Any father might have been forgiven for being devotedly fond of such a daughter as Rosamond Duncombe.

Rosamond was one of those light-hearted, womanly creatures who seem born to make home a paradise. She had a sweet temper; a laugh which was like music; a manner which was fascination itself.