Johnny Ludlow Second Series Part 41

"It was not stolen at all, then?"

"Not at all, Cripp. And the poor creature we suspected of taking it proves to be a very respectable old body indeed, nothing of the tramp about her. You--you have not gone any lengths yet with that professional gentleman, I hope!" added the Squire, dropping his voice to a confidential tone.

Cripp paused for a minute, as if not understanding.

"We have not employed any professional man at all in the matter," said he; "have not thought of doing so."

"I don't mean that, Cripp. _You_ know. The gentleman you suspected of having bought the earring."

Cripp stared. "I have not suspected any one."

"Goodness me! you need not be so cautious, Cripp," returned the Squire, somewhat nettled. "Eccles made a confidant of me. He told me all about it--except the name."

"What Eccles?" asked Cripp. "I really do not know what you are talking of, sir."

"What Eccles--why, your Eccles. Him you sent over to me on Sunday afternoon: a well-dressed, gentlemanly man, with a black moustache.

Detective Eccles."

"I do not know any Detective Eccles."

"Dear me, my good man, you must be losing your memory!" retorted the Squire, in wrath. "He came straight to me from you on Sunday; you sent him off in haste without his dinner."

"Quite a mistake, sir," said the sergeant. "It was not I who sent him."

"Why, bless my heart and mind, Cripp, you'll be for telling me next the sun never shone! Where's your recollection gone to?"

"I hope my recollection is where it always has been, Squire. We must be at cross-purposes. I do not know any one of the name of Eccles, and I have not sent any one to you. As a proof that I could not have done it, I may tell you, sir, that I was summoned to Gloucester on business last Friday directly after I saw you, and did not get back here until this morning."

The Squire rubbed his face, whilst he revolved probabilities, and thought Cripp must be dreaming.

"He came direct from you--from yourself, Cripp; and he disclosed to me your reasons for hoping you had found the earring, and your doubts of the honesty of the man who had bought it--the lawyer, you remember. And he brought back the other earring to you that you might compare them."

"Eh--what?" cried Cripp, briskly. "Brought away the other earring, do you say, sir?"

"To be sure he did. What else did you send him for?"

"And he has not returned it to you?"

"Returned it! of course not. You hold it, don't you?"

"Then, Squire Todhetley, you have been cleverly robbed of this second earring," cried Cripp, quietly. "_Dodged_ out of it, sir. The man who went over to you must have been a member of the swell-mob. Well-dressed, and a black moustache!"

"He was a college man, had been at Oxford," debated the unfortunate pater, sitting on a chair in awful doubt. "He told me so."

"You did not see him there, sir," said the sergeant, with a suppressed laugh. "I might tell you I had a duke for a grandmother; but it would be none nearer the fact."

"Mercy upon us all!" groaned the Squire. "What a mortification it will be if that other earring's gone! Don't you think some one in your station here may have sent him, if you were out yourself?"

"I will inquire, for your satisfaction, Squire Todhetley," said the sergeant, opening the door; "but I can answer for it beforehand that it will be useless."

It was as Cripp thought. Eccles was not known at the station, and no one had been sent to us.

"It all comes of that advertis.e.m.e.nt you put in, Squire," finished up Cripp, by way of consolation. "The swell-mob would not have known there was a valuable jewel missing but for that, or the address of those who had missed it."

The pater came home more crestfallen than a whipped schoolboy, after leaving stringent orders with Cripp and his men to track out the swindler. It was a blow to all of us.

"I said he looked as much like a detective as I'm like a Dutchman,"

quoth Tod.

"Well, it's frightfully mortifying," said the Squire.

"And the way he polished off that beef, and drank down the ale! I wonder he did not contrive to walk off with the silver tankard!"

"Be quiet, Joe! You are laughing, sir! Do you think it is a laughing matter?"

"Well, I don't know," said bold Tod. "It was cleverly done."

Up rose the pater in a pa.s.sion. Vowing vengeance against the swindlers who went about the world, got up in good clothes and a moustache; and heartily promising the absent and unconscious Cripp to be down upon him if he did not speedily run the man to earth.

And that's how Mrs. Todhetley lost the other earring.

IX.

A TALE OF SIN.

+Part the first.+

If I don't relate this quite as usual, and it is found to be different from what I generally write, it is because I know less about it than others know. The history is Duffham's; not mine. And there are diaries in it, and all kinds of foreign things. That is, foreign to me. Duffham holds all the papers, and has lent them to me to use. It came about in this way.

"Whilst you are picking up the sea-breezes, Johnny," he said, when I called to tell him where I was going, "you can be getting on with another paper or two for us, I hope; for we like your stories."

"But I am going away for a rest, Mr. Duffham; not to work. I don't want to be ransacking memory for materials during any holiday, and then weaving them into what you call a story. Much rest that would be!"

"I'll give you the materials for one," he said; "plenty of them: it won't take much weaving; you'll have it all before your eyes. It will be nothing but play-work to you; just a bit of copying."

"But I don't care to put fiction on paper and send it forth as though it were true. What I tell of has mostly happened, you know."

Duffham laughed a little. "If everything told in print were as true as this, Johnny Ludlow, the world would have witnessed some strange events.

Not that you'll find anything strange in this tale: it is quite matter-of-fact. There's no romance about it; nothing but stern reality."

"Well, let me see the papers."

Duffham went out of the surgery, and came back with his spectacles on, and carrying some papers tied up with pink tape.

"You'll find a sort of narrative begun, Johnny," he said, untying the tape, "for I tried my own hand at it. But I found I could not get on well. Writing ma.n.u.scripts is not so much in my line as doctoring patients."