“Jason, (he began) are you playing me false? Have you set another man on the track with a view to bilk me of my promised fee? Explain, or I throw up the business.”
Herewith, Mr. Grabman gave a minute description of the stranger, and related pretty accurately what had passed between that gentleman and himself. He then added the progress of his own inquiries, and renewed, as peremptorily as he dared, his demand for candour and plain dealing. Now, it so happened that in stumbling upstairs to bed, Mr. Grabman passed the room in which his mysterious fellow-seeker was lodged, and as is the usage in hotels, a pair of boots stood outside the door, to be cleaned betimes in the morning. Though somewhat drunk, Grabman still preserved the rays of his habitual astuteness. A clever and a natural idea shot across his brain, illuminating the fumes of the brandy; he stooped, and while one hand on the wall steadied his footing, with the other he fished up a boot, and peering within, saw legibly written: “John Ardworth, Esq., Gray’s Inn.” At that sight he felt what a philosopher feels at the sudden elucidation of a troublesome problem. Downstairs again tottered Grabman, re-opened his letter, and wrote,—
“P.S.—I have wronged you, Jason, by my suspicions; never mind,—jubilate! This interloper who made me so jealous, who think you it is? Why, young Ardworth himself,—that is, the lad who goes by such name. Now, is it not clear? Of course no one else has such interest in learning his birth as the lost child himself,—here he is! If old Ardworth lives (as he says), old Ardworth has set him to work on his own business. But then, that Fielden,—rather a puzzler that! Yet—no. Now I understand,—old Ardworth gave the boy to Mrs. Joplin, and took it away from her again when he went to the parson’s. Now, certainly, it may be quite necessary to prove,—first, that the boy he took from Mr. Braddell’s he gave to Mrs. Joplin; secondly, that the boy he left with Mr. Fielden was the same that he took again from that woman: therefore, the necessity of finding out Mother Joplin, an essential witness. Q. E. D., Master Jason!”
It was not till the sun had been some hours risen that Mr. Grabman imitated that luminary’s example. When he did so, he found, somewhat to his chagrin, that John Ardworth had long been gone. In fact, whatever the motive that had led the latter on the search, he had succeeded in gleaning from Grabman all that that person could communicate, and their interview had inspired him with such disgust of the attorney, and so small an opinion of the value of his co-operation (in which last belief, perhaps, he was mistaken), that he had resolved to continue his inquiries alone, and had already, in his early morning’s walk through the village, ascertained that the man with whom Mrs. Joplin had quitted the place had some time after been sentenced to six months’ imprisonment in the county jail. Possibly the prison authorities might know something to lead to his discovery, and through him the news of his paramour might be gained.
CHAPTER XX. MORE OF MRS. JOPLIN.
One day, at the hour of noon, the court boasting the tall residence of Mr. Grabman was startled from the quiet usually reigning there at broad daylight by the appearance of two men, evidently no inhabitants of the place. The squalid, ill-favoured denizens lounging before the doors stared hard, and at the fuller view of one of the men, most of them retreated hastily within. Then, in those houses, you might have heard a murmur of consternation and alarm. The ferret was in the burrow,—a Bow-Street officer in the court! The two men paused, looked round, and stopping before the dingy towerlike house, selected the bell which appealed to the inmates of the ground-floor, to the left. At that summons Bill the cracksman imprudently presented a full view of his countenance through his barred window; he drew it back with astonishing celerity, but not in time to escape the eye of the Bow-Street runner.
“Open the door, Bill,—there’s nothing to fear; I have no summons against you, ‘pon honour. You know I never deceive. Why should I? Open the door, I say.”
No answer.
The officer tapped with his cane at the foul window.