'She 'll miss the hunting, I 'm afraid,' he thought miserably, contrasting their present separation with all the joy and happiness that they had so fully intended should be theirs this winter.
Mr. Semple had a shrewdness acquired from many years' experience in legal matters, and he shook his head when Peter made the suggestion that probably his brother had died in infancy. 'The conclusion I have arrived at, after years of legal work,' he said, 'is that the undesirable person lives, while the useful or much wanted one dies. Those who encumber the ground remain longest upon it, and the person in receipt of a large annuity or pension is proverbially long-lived. However, we have so far not found a single trace of the existence of Edward Ogilvie, though you must remember we have not yet ascertained in which different parts of Spain your mother lived during those two years which she spent there.'
'I don't see who on earth is to tell us!' ejaculated Peter. 'She generally had foreign maids about her, and I think I always had French nurses. I never heard of any old servant who went with her on her travels; and although, of course, money was paid to her by her bank, and letters were forwarded to her by the bankers, the actual addresses to which they were sent have not been kept after an interval of twenty-five years. One of the old clerks at Coutts's remembers, in an indefinite sort of way, that he forwarded packages for a long time to Madrid, and afterwards, he thinks, to Toledo, and then farther south, and at one time to Cintra; but my mother's headquarters seem always to have been in Granada, and the clerk says that he can give me no dates nor indeed any exact information.'
'I did not know she had been at Cintra or Toledo,' said Mr. Semple thoughtfully.
'I won't swear that she had,' said Peter. 'The Peninsula wasn't so generally known twenty-five years ago as it is now. Travelling was difficult then, and people in England, who have not themselves travelled much, are very liable to get confused about the names of foreign places.'
'Still,' said the lawyer, 'Cintra and Toledo are places that every one knows.'
'You mean,' said Peter, 'that in a well-known place, with English people living in it, there would be more likelihood of getting the information which we want?'
'I mean,' said Mr. Semple, 'that, as there is no evidence of your brother ever having been seen at Juarez, the next thing is to find out in what place there is evidence of his appearance.'
It was late afternoon, and as all clerical work for the day was now finished, Peter suggested and Mr. Semple readily agreed to a walk in the gardens. There was nothing left in the flower-beds, but the conservatories and the orchid-house were a real feast of pleasure to the lawyer. He went into the outer hall to fetch his stick and coat, and then, turning back towards his host, he made a humorous signal to convey the intelligence that some callers had driven up to the door. Peter retreated precipitately; but Mr. Semple had already been seen and was hailed by Mr. Lawrence, who had, a few minutes before, drawn up to the entrance in his big red motor-car. Already Mr. Lawrence was in earnest conversation with the butler, and his feminine-like ejaculations could be heard now as he stood and conversed with the man at the hall door. He stood on the doorstep while his guests in the motor, who seemed to fear that they might be intrusive, looked as though they would prefer to hasten their departure.
'Ah, how-do-you-do, Mr. Semple,' said Mr. Lawrence in his high-pitched voice, advancing a few steps into the hall. 'It is a great piece of luck meeting you like this! I have just driven over with my friends, Sir John and Lady Falconer.—Lady Falconer, may I introduce my friend, Mr. Semple?—This is a very sad house to come to, Mr. Semple, is it not?' he said, and paused, hoping for a little gossip from the lawyer. 'I was just driving through the village, and I have been to see the church with my friends, and we thought we would run in and inquire how everything was going on.'