Volume Ii Part 8 (2/2)
”Very good, sir,” rejoined the visitor coolly. ”My address is upon that card. If I had known the sort of reception that awaited me here, I should not perhaps have been so anxious to do my duty. Gentlemen, I wish you good-day. I am sorry to have interrupted your repast.”
”Don't mention it, my good sir,” observed the Bow Street runner, as he disposed of his third slice of ham. ”I have treated you as no stranger, I a.s.sure you.”
To this sarcasm the visitor made no reply, but bowing to the rest of the company, was about to withdraw with polite severity, when Mr. Long stepped forward, and took him by the hand. ”I believe you are a kindly-hearted man,” cried he, ”who has been grievously wronged by those whom you have attempted to benefit; but in any case, it cannot do you any harm to have shaken hands with an honest man, and one who is a humble minister of the gospel.”
I could have jumped up and shaken hands with the stranger also, but a false shame prevented me. I thought that Townshend was only waiting for the poor fellow to go to become contemptuously cynical upon those who had shown any belief in him. The Bow Street runner, however, said never a word, but proceeded with his interminable breakfast.
Mr. Long was speechless with indignation. I saw Lucy Gerard cast an approving glance at my excellent tutor, and then an imploring one towards her father, who was biting his lips, as if to restrain his laughter.
At last, the rector broke silence. ”I gather from what you have stated, Mr. Townshend, that you will scarcely consider it worth while to go down to Nutgall, or make any further inquiry into the circ.u.mstances of which you have just heard.”
”It will certainly not be worth _my_ while,” returned the Bow Street runner curtly.
”Then I shall go down into Cambridges.h.i.+re myself,” observed my tutor.
”Very good, sir. If time were less valuable to me, it would give me a great deal of pleasure to accompany you.”
”My dear Peter,” remarked my tutor, taking no notice of this wicked banter, ”what do you say to coming with me?”
Even if I had been less disposed to do this than I was, I should still have readily consented to be the rector's travelling companion, for to refuse would have been to declare myself upon the enemy's side.
Accordingly, we set off upon this amateur detective expedition that very day; and on the following evening returned to Harley Street, having possessed ourselves of this important information: That benevolence is sometimes a.s.sumed for the base purpose of making a few s.h.i.+llings, and that advertis.e.m.e.nts are occasionally taken advantage of to the confusion of those who insert them. There was really a village called Nutgall; that was the one fact that the respectable person in half-mourning had brought along with his black leather bag and silk umbrella. There was not a public-house in the place where Sir Ma.s.singberd could have procured that bottle and a half of French brandy, had he been ever so disposed to dissipation, or even where we ourselves could get bread and cheese.
I verily believe, at the time of his disenchantment, my revered tutor would rather that the baronet had been really at Nutgall, and in the humour and condition to wage implacable war against poor Marmaduke, than have given such an opportunity of triumph to the man of Bow Street.
CHAPTER XIII.
BETTER THAN A BLUNDERBUSS.
It was the Runner's custom to call at Mr. Gerard's every evening, no matter how often he might have been there during the day, in order to report progress, or that there was none; and when his knock at the front-door was heard, I perceived the rector wince upon his chair, like one who has been roasted a little already, and expects to be before the fire again immediately. Mr. Townshend, however, did not even so much as allude to our Will-o'-the-Wisp pursuit, cautioned, perhaps, not to do so by our host, or besought by his daughter, as I fancy. I do not think that the gravity of the intelligence he brought with him would, of itself, have blunted Mr. Townshend's appet.i.te for acrimonious jesting, which was insatiable; and, indeed, the issues of Death or Life, and of Lost or Found, formed so much the ordinary business of his life, that any discovery, no matter of what nature, disturbed him as little as finding a gentleman with his head off disturbs the King of Dahomey.
”Well, Mr. Long, I am glad to see you back again,” said he; ”you are the very man I want. Does a farmer of the name of Arabel happen to reside in or near your parish?”
”He lives at Fairburn, within a stone's throw----”
”You will never make a Bow Street runner,” interrupted Mr. Townshend, shaking his head.
”Well, then,” continued my tutor good-humouredly, ”if accuracy is so essential, I will say within half a mile and a few yards of my own Rectory.”
”That is better, sir,” returned the detective gravely. ”And what sort of a character do you consider this man to bear?”
”Mr. Arabel is an honest man and a good churchman,” replied the rector positively; ”and but for a little occasional excess----”
”A drunkard, eh?” observed the Bow Street officer, briskly.
”No, certainly not, Mr. Townshend. He takes too much liquor now and then, I believe; but, I regret to say it, there are few more sober persons in my parish than Richard Arabel.”
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