Then Mrs. James Carthew made a totally unexpected and, as I still hold, a really humorous remark.
"Drat the fellow!" she said. "And he preached an Assize Sermon too!"
But once again her ass of a mate broke in.
"What, in the devil's name, are you parleying about, Maria? Addison or no Addison, you don't suppose I'm to be blackmailed into buying Welland for that young whelp!"
"Just as you please," said I. "If you prefer the money being raised for him on the entail, so be it."
"On the entail?" He opened and shut his mouth like a fish.
"Yes, sir; on the entail—his parents not having employed Mr. Addison to marry them."
But at this point Mrs. James, without deigning me another look, tucked the poor fool under her arm and carried him off.
I left Tregarrick two days later with a hundred pounds in my pocket: for the odd notes seemed to me a fair commission on a very satisfactory job. Now, as I look back on my adventure, I detect several curious points in it. The first is, that I have never set eyes on Susie Martin: the second, that I never had another interview with Mr. or Mrs. James Carthew: the third, that neither then nor since have I ever had a word of thanks from the lady and child to whom I rendered this signal service. The one, so far as I know, never saw me: the other saw me only for that instant when he dropped me a penny for a trick. To both, I am known only as Captain Richard Steele, and whoever inhabits Welland pays five shillings out of one pocket into another for his tenancy, and will continue to do so. But, perhaps, what the reader will most wonder at, is that I—Gabriel Foot—having my hand on three thousand five hundred pounds, and a clear run for it, should have yielded up all but a hundred for a widow and orphan, who never heard of my existing. Well, perhaps, the secret is that Leggat intended to yield it, and I pride myself on being a better man than Leggat. In short, I have, within limits, a conscience.