"
"A complete stranger," Mr. Ascough agreed. "I had never seen him
before in my life. I did a little trifling business for him in
connection with his property."
"He told you nothing of his family or relatives?"
"He told me that he had not a relation in the world."
"You knew him slightly, then?" Brooks continued, "all the time he was in
London? And when he left for that voyage he came to you."
"Yes."
"He made over his small income then to my mother in trust for me. Did
it strike you as strange that he should do this instead of making a
will?"
"Not particularly," Mr. Ascough declared. "As you know, it is not an
unusual course."
"It did not suggest to you any determination on his part never to return
to England?"
"Certainly not."
"He left England on friendly terms with my mother?"
"Certainly. She and he were people for whom I and every one who knew
anything of their lives had the highest esteem and admiration."
"You can imagine no reason, then, for my father leaving England for
good?"
"Certainly not!"
"You know of no reason why he should have abandoned his trip to
Australia and gone to Canada?"
"None!"
"His doing so is as inexplicable to you as to me?"
"Entirely.
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