“Yes,” replied Brittles; “I sent a message up by the coachman, and I only wonder they weren’t here before, sir.”
“You did, did you? Then confound your —— slow coaches down here; that’s all,” said the doctor, walking away.
CHAPTER XXX.
INVOLVES A CRITICAL POSITION.
“Who’s that?” inquired Brittles, opening the door a little way, with the chain up, and peeping out, shading the candle with his hand.
“Open the door,” replied a man outside; “it’s the officers from Bow-street, as was sent to, to-day.”
Much comforted by this assurance, Brittles opened the door to its full width, and confronted a portly man in a great-coat, who walked in without saying anything more, and wiped his shoes on the mat as coolly as if he lived there.
“Just send somebody out to relieve my mate, will you, young man?” said the officer; “he’s in the gig minding the prad. Have you got a coach’us here that you could put it up in for five or ten minutes?”
Brittles replying in the affirmative, and pointing out the building, the portly man stepped back to the garden-gate, and helped his companion to put up the gig, while Brittles lighted them, in a state of great admiration. This done, they returned to the house, and, being shewn into a parlour, took off their great-coats and hats, and shewed like what they were. The man who had knocked at the door was a stout personage of middle height, aged about fifty, with shiny black hair, cropped pretty close, half-whiskers, a round face, and sharp eyes. The other was a red-headed, bony man, in top-boots, with a rather ill-favoured countenance, and a turned-up, sinister-looking nose.