"Do you think you can watch the gentleman without being
observed?" I asked. "I'm pretty well sure I can, sir," answered the boy,
who is of an enterprising, and indeed audacious, temper. "Very well,"
said I, "you will go to the Black Swan Inn. Hawkehurst is the name by
which my nephew is known there, and it will be your duty to find him
out." I gave the boy a minute account of Valentine's appearance, and
other instructions with which I need not trouble you. I further furnished
him with money, so that he might be able to follow Hawkehurst by rail, or
any other mode of conveyance, if necessary; and then despatched him, with
an order to come back to me when he had seen our man safely lodged in the
Black Swan after his day's perambulations. "And if he shouldn't go out at
all?" suggested the lad. "In that case you must stick to your post till
nightfall, and pick up all the information you can about my unfortunate
nephew from the hangers-on of the hotel," said I. "I suppose you know
some one at the Black Swan?" The boy informed me, in his untutored
language, that he knew "a'most all of 'em," and thereupon departed.
At nine o'clock at night he again appeared before me, big with the
importance of his day's work. He had seen my nephew issue forth from the
Black Swan within an hour of leaving my presence, and had followed him,
first to Mr. William Judson's in Ferrygate, where he waited and hung
about nearly an hour, keeping himself well out of view round the corner
of Chalkin Street, a turning close to Mr.
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