 Ingot gave Lord Hazard an account of a Madmoiselle Le Clerc, who had some business with Sir Sidney, and that this account tallied so exactly with the story of Annette's mother, as to confirm both Lady Hazard and Lady Roebuck in an opinion that it could be no other than her.
This Lady, as we are informed by Emma, left some jewels at Sir Sidney's, but she refused, at the instance of one of the gentlemen who accompanied her, to leave a packet of papers.
I will now be honest enough to declare that this gentleman was no other than Combrie, and his reason for advising the lady not to leave the papers, arose from a sear lest Sir Sidney should actually know who she was, and discover what were then her intentions. The same reason induced him to prevail on her not to see the baronet in town.
The third person, who was, as I have said, deputed by the convent to receive the fortune, was our old friend Goufre, and it was from this journey Combrie became so well acquainted with all his affairs;

nay he had attended the young lady with a view to have surprised the vigilance of the procureur, and have secured her fortune when in England, which circumstance I also hint in the second volume; but this, however, not being practicable, he had afterwards recourse, as we have seen, to other methods, which were attended with better success.
It has been related that, on Mrs. Hazard's monument, at Rochester, were placed her maiden name, the name of her first husband, and of that she owned when she died. This circumstance, superadded to some intelligence obtained from one of the firm of Bondham and Co.—indeed the very gentleman who afterwards went to Botany Bay—confirmed Mr. Gloss's conjectures. He had however a great deal of collateral intelligence: one of his emissaries having been constantly stationed by the side of our hero, who, had he attempted to return to England, had instructions to lay him by the heels, either in Flanders, or on his arrival, just as might be most expedient to assist the purposes of Mr. Gloss. Finding however that marriage had barred every passage that could lead to the possession of Annette, he at first made himself perfectly easy, but when he heard of the death of Mrs. Hazard, and found that these impediments were removed, he was obliged

to cast about in his mind for fresh matter, and, after straining his ingenuity, and putting a variety of circumstances together, taking a hint from the name
