"Yes, Mr. Cornwall."
"Give it to me. I will rattle there in a cab, and if I cannot learn anything about her, I will join you at No. 12."
"You will find it difficult to obtain any information of her, sir."
"Money will accomplish anything. I shall find out what I want to know."
Promising the cabman double fare if he drove at his fastest pace, Fred, in less than half an hour, arrived at the woman's lodgings. The landlady, as Kiss had foreseen, was disinclined to speak of her lodger, but a tip of half a sovereign and the promise of another loosened her tongue.
"I don't see, after all," said the landlady, "why I shouldn't oblige you. She has left the rooms, and is not coming back."
Then she related how the woman had gone away in an open manner, saying that she was about to leave England, and did not intend to return. She was not going abroad alone; some friends were going with her. That was all.
"Can you tell me her name?" asked Fred.
The landlady replied that she did not know it.
That was the extent of the information Fred could obtain; and there was nothing for it but to go back to Surrey Street and ascertain whether anything had been heard of the Pamfletts. Nothing had been heard, and none of the neighbours could enlighten them. It was evident that they must have taken the greatest pains to get out of the neighbourhood unobserved.