"Yes."
"O dear! Then I am glad he is out of my house. Really! we might all have been murdered in our beds!" And the woman held up her thin hands in horror.
After that she told what she could of Nick Jasniff. She said he had spent a good part of his time, both day and night, down in the heart of London, visiting the theaters and other places of amusement. Once he had complained of being robbed of his pocketbook on a tram-car, and again he had lost himself in Cheapside and fallen in with some thugs who had tried to carry him into an alleyway. In the fight that followed he had had an eye blackened and the sleeve torn from his coat. She had sewed on the sleeve again, but he had paid her nothing for the work.
"He spoke once of visiting an old friend named Chesterfield, who lived in Siddingate," said the woman. "He said he might meet his father there. Maybe if you can find this Chesterfield you'll find him."
"We can try, anyway," answered Dave. "Is that all you can tell about him?"
"I don't know of much else, Mr.—— I haven't learned your name yet."
"My name is David Porter. This is my friend Roger Morr."
"Porter? Why, I've heard that name somewhere." The woman mused for a moment. "Why, yes, Nicholas Jasniff had a friend by that name—a gentleman much older than you."
"A friend!" gasped Dave. "Oh, that can't be true, Mrs. Clever!"
"Well, I heard him say something about a man named Porter. They had met somewhere—I think in London. The man had a daughter named Laura, and I think this Jasniff had been calling upon her."