"Why not? How do you know?"

"Well, why should they? I only hope he hasn't gone and made a fool of
himself in any way that'll make a scandal or get him into trouble. In a
way, you know, we are connections. His mother and mine were second
cousins. That's really why I feel that I ought to do somethin' to find
out what has happened to him. Do you--do you think he can have got mixed
up with some woman?"

"I won't say that I actually think so, but I think it's more than
possible."

"No! Why? What woman?"

At that instant I remembered that the woman I had in my mind was the
woman who on board the _Masonic_ had, so Jack had told me, called
herself Hugesson Gastrell's wife, and called herself his wife again at
the house in Maresfield Gardens. But Gastrell had told Easterton, or at
any rate led him to suppose, he was unmarried. How, then, could I refer
to this woman by name without causing possible friction between
Easterton and his tenant, Gastrell?

"I am afraid I can't tell you, Easterton," I said after an instant's
hesitation. "I don't want to make mischief, and if what I think is
possible is not the case, and I tell you about it, I shall have made
mischief."

Easterton was silent. For some moments he remained seated in his corner
of the settee, looking at me rather strangely.