"I'll not deny that!" asserted Lauriston, with an ingenuous blush. "We are!"
"Well, you can't ask any girl to marry you, man, while there's the least bit of suspicion hanging over you that you'd a hand in her grandfather's death!" remarked Purdie sapiently. "So we'll just eat a bit of lunch together, and then get a taxi-cab and drive out to find this old gentleman that gave your mother the rings. Come on to the hotel."
"You're spending a fine lot of money over me, John!" exclaimed
Lauriston.
"Put it down that I'm a selfish chap that's got interested, and is following his own pleasure!" said Purdie. "Man alive!—I was never mixed up in a detective case before—it beats hunting for animals, this hunting for men!"
By a diligent search in directories and reference books early that morning, Purdie and Lauriston had managed to trace Mr. Edward Killick, who, having been at one time a well-known solicitor in the City, had followed the practice of successful men and retired to enjoy the fruit of his labours in a nice little retreat in the country. Mr. Killick had selected the delightful old-world village of Stanmore as the scene of his retirement, and there, in a picturesque old house, set in the midst of fine trees and carefully trimmed lawns, Purdie and Lauriston found him—a hale and hearty old gentleman, still on the right side of seventy, who rose from his easy chair in a well-stocked library to look in astonishment from the two cards which his servant had carried to him at the persons and faces of their presenters.
"God bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "Are you two young fellows the sons of old friends of mine at Peebles?"
"We are, sir," answered Purdie. "This is Andrew Lauriston, and I am John Purdie. And we're very glad to find that you remember something about our people, Mr. Killick."
Mr. Killick again blessed himself, and after warmly shaking hands with his visitors, bade them sit down. He adjusted his spectacles, and looked both young men carefully over.
"I remember your people very well indeed!" he said. "I used to do a bit of fishing in the Tweed and in Eddleston Water with your father, Mr. Purdie—and I stopped some time with your father and mother, at their house, Mr. Lauriston. In fact, your mother was remarkably kind to me—she nursed me through an illness with which I was seized when I was in Peebles."
Lauriston and Purdie exchanged glances—by common consent Purdie became spokesman for the two.