"In Charing Cross Road," she said. "He was trying to sell some books, and I watched him go in and out of half-a-dozen shops without any luck. Then I went up and spoke to him. At first he wouldn't tell me what he was doing, but I asked him to tea and wriggled it out of him."
"Well?"
"It was a good job I did ask him to tea. Otherwise he'd have gone without—for he hadn't a penny on him—nothing but the return ticket to Haslemere.... He'd thought he'd get quite a pile of money for the books, but the dealers wouldn't even make an offer—no market for scientific treatises in German, they said.... He couldn't understand it."
"But why did he want to sell the books at all?"
"That's what I asked him.... It seems he saw the bill that Taplow was making up for father to pay. He hadn't had any idea he was costing so much. He said he felt it couldn't go on any longer—that he must find work of some sort and put an end to it."
"But surely he would need his books for his work?"
"No.... He wasn't thinking of that kind of work. He was prepared for anything—to take a job in the colonies—to go to sea—anything...."
"That would be no use."
"I know. I told him he had far better stay at the hotel till he was well enough to carry on with his research work."
"And what did he say to that?"