"Great God!" cried the old man, looking up in horror--"starved?"
"Well--for all you had to do with it! You're just as much a murderer as if they actually had perished of want, leaving them as you did But they didn't. Neighbours found them out only just in time; found out her brother; and he, when he found you'd gone off, came round and took his sister to his heart again. He was a printer just starting for himself, and he took his sister--she'd always been his favourite--to his new home; and there she died three weeks after her arrival."
"Died? Ann died? not of--"
"No, not of starvation, if you mean that; they said she died of a broken heart at having been deserted by the man she worshipped; but we know by medical science that that's an impossibility--don't we? At all events, she died; and then the printer, who was a rising man, looked after the little girl. He looked after her in an odd way. He had a foster-brother, who was a rider in a circus; and when the little girl was six years old he placed her with the circus-people, where she remained until he started her in life on her own account."
"She lived, then?"
"Oh dear, yes; lived considerably; lives now and flourishes, and does extremely well. You have heard of a riding-mistress and horsebreaker, Miss Kate Mellon?"
"I have heard of such a person; and I have not heard--"
"Steady, please! Kate Mellon is Ann Moore's daughter. I need not point out her relationship to you. You shake your head. Proofs of course you want? I've taken the liberty of ringing the bell. Be good enough," added Mr. Simnel, to the clerk who appeared, "to tell that person who is waiting outside to step in. Do you recognise him?" he asked of Mr. Townshend, as Scadgers entered the room.
Mr. Townshend, shading his eyes with his hand, looked long at the new-comer, and then said, "It is George Moore!"
"Right enough, sir," said Mr. Scadgers; "though it's many a long day since we met; and we're neither of us so young as then. Lord bless me! when I look at the Runner--we used to call him the 'Runner' because of Townshend of Bow Street, which was a nickname for him," added he, turning to Mr. Simnel,--"when I look at the Runner, and think how long it is since I left my mark on him about--"