Another reason for my feeling thus stale and "cheap" on this particular morning was that the ardour with which I had taken up the hunting down of the Dumpling had considerably cooled. I am sympathetic by nature, and, mad though he was, this man's passionate denunciation of the wrongs of the poor, and the terrible and, I fear, only too true picture which he had drawn of their sufferings, had strangely moved me. The tragedy of poverty, the fact that a man's spirit could be so broken, that he could be brought to such infamy as to pawn his very manhood, to become, as the Dumpling had said, like bullocks and steers, and to bow his head to the yoke, for the sake of a roof to cover the heads of wife and children; the fact that women could be brought to such a pass as to be compelled to choose between starvation or the streets, had come home to me with new and awful significance. Even as out of the mouth of babes and sucklings God brings forth wisdom, so out of the mouth of a madman and a fanatic had some of the sternest and most terrible facts of life been brought to my realisation.
When such things could be, it seemed to me that to be spending time and strength in playing at being a detective, and in writing what a newspaper once aptly described as "harmless little tales with titles that appal," was almost criminal. I was more than minded to throw the whole thing up, and to occupy myself, instead, in doing what little I could to relieve the suffering of my less fortunate fellow-creatures.
With these thoughts still seething in my brain, I dressed, and after breakfasting, sallied out to make my report to Miss Clara.
She received me with the same cordiality with which we had parted, and on learning that I had news to impart, sent word to that effect to Kate, who, she said, would be equally interested to hear it.
I told my story, just as I have set it down in the previous chapter, omitting nothing, and giving the Dumpling's words in regard to the poor and their sufferings almost as those words had fallen from his lips.
Upon one of my listeners, at least, the narrative had a most unexpected effect. Kate heard me throughout with very evident sympathy, and was clearly alarmed and disturbed at the risk I had run in my encounter with the Dumpling. Otherwise she was not in any sense moved. But upon the elder woman's face, as I unfolded my story, there suddenly came a look like that of one who has received a crushing blow. For a moment or two I feared she was about to faint; but by an effort she collected herself, and sat out the remainder of the recital quietly and impassively.
When I had made an end of my narrative her only comment was, "Quite exciting, I'm sure!" Then she rose, and walking to the door, beckoned Kate to her. Whispering a few words in the girl's ears—not more than a dozen at most—she passed out.
Kate turned to me.
"Mr. Rissler," she said, "I want you to promise that you will do nothing of the sort again."
"Nothing of what sort, Miss Carleton?" I asked, wondering whether she was speaking for herself, or from instructions she had received from her aunt.