"I suppose there's nothing really to connect this man Gaspard with it?"
"Oh, nothing at present, sir. Did you say you'd known the deceased before he—?"
"If I'm called at the inquest, I shall tell all I know," said Kilshaw, rising. "It's not much."
"Happen to know if he had any relations, sir?"
"H'm. He was a widower, I believe."
"Children?"
"Really," said Mr. Kilshaw, with a faint smile, "I don't know."
And he escaped from pertinacious Mr. Dawson with some alacrity. When he was outside, he stopped suddenly. "Shall I tell 'em to apply to Medland?" he asked himself, with a malicious chuckle. "No, I'll wait a bit yet," and he walked on, wondering whether by any chance Mr. Benham had been done to death to save the Premier. This fanciful idea he soon dismissed with a laugh; it never entered his head, prejudiced as he was, to think that Medland himself had any hand in the matter. After all, he was a man of common sense, and he quickly arrived at a conclusion which he expressed by exclaiming,
"The poor fool's been showing his money. Who's got my five hundred now, I wonder?"