"You may be sure that I shall not rest until I find him, Mr. Pettigrew," Hilda said. "I shall devote my life to it. I love the child dearly; but even were he a perfect stranger to me I would do everything in my power, if only to prevent this man from obtaining the proceeds of his villainy."
"My dear Miss Covington," he said, "you really must not speak like this. Of course, with us it is perfectly safe. I admit that you have good reason for your indignation, but you must really moderate your expressions, which might cause infinite mischief were you to use them before other people. In the eye of the law a man is innocent until he is proved guilty, and we have not a shadow of proof that this man has anything to do with the child's abduction. Moreover, it might do harm in other ways. To begin with, it might render the discovery of the child more difficult; for if his abductors were aware or even suspected that you were searching in all directions for him, they would take all the greater pains to conceal his hiding-place."
"I will be careful, Mr. Farmer, but I shall proceed to have a search made at every workhouse and night refuge and place of that sort in London, and within twenty miles round, and issue more placards of your offer of a reward of five hundred pounds for information. There is no harm in that."
"Certainly not. Those are the measures that one would naturally take in any case. Indeed, I should already have pushed my inquiries in that direction, but I have hitherto felt sure that had he been merely taken for his clothes, the police would have traced him before now; but as they have not been able to do so, that it was a case of blackmail, and that we should hear very shortly from the people that had stolen him. I sincerely trust that this may the case, and that it will turn out that this man Simcoe has nothing whatever to do with it. I will come down and let you know what steps we are taking from time to time, and learn the directions in which you are pushing your inquiries."
Neither Miss Purcell nor Netta had spoken from the time they had entered the room, but as soon as they took their places in the carriage waiting for them, they burst out.
"What an extraordinary thing, Hilda! And yet," Miss Purcell added, "the search for Walter may do good in one way; it will prevent you from turning your thoughts constantly to the past and to the loss that you have suffered."