Jim Swain came in, his face full of eagerness:
"Have you found her, sir? Is she at home? Does she know?"
"No, Jim," said Mr. Felton, "she's not at home, and no one knows anything of her."
"Sir," exclaimed Jim--"miss, I'm sure she's somewheres about the prison. Has any one thought of lookin' for her there? She'd go there, sir and miss--she'd go there. Take me with you, and let us go and look for her. I daren't go alone; she wouldn't listen to me, she wouldn't look at me; but I'm sure she's there."
"Uncle," said Clare, earnestly, "I am sure he is right--I feel sure he is right. Pray go; take one of the servants and him. The carriage is waiting for me; take it and go."
Mr. Carruthers did as she desired. It was wonderful to see the change that had come over him with the awakening of his better nature. He had always been energetic, and now he forgot to be pompous and self-engrossed.
The streets in the dismal quarter of the prison were comparatively silent and empty when Mr. Carruthers called to the coachman to stop, and got out of the carriage, Jim descending from the box, and they began their dismal search. It was not prolonged or difficult.
They found her sitting on the ground, supported by the prison wall, in an angle where after nightfall there was little resort of footsteps and but dim light--a corner in which the tired wayfarer might rest, unquestioned, for a little, by either the policeman or the passer-by. And no more tired wayfarer had ever sat down to rest, even in the pitiless London streets, than the woman who had wandered about until the friendly night had fallen, and had then come there to die, and have done with it.
They took her to her own home, and when they removed her shawl a slip of paper, on which George Dallas's name was written, was found pinned to the front of her dress. It contained these words:
"The boy's story is true. I did not keep the diamonds taken out of the studs. You sold them when you sold your mother's. I was always sorry you ever knew us. H. Routh."