He knew before he rose from the tea table who he was likely to see standing there on the doormat, and yet when his eyes fell on the uniform of the policeman who stood just under the gaslight, his knees threatened to give way under him.
"Yes, that's the lad; I thought I wasn't mistaken," said the man.
And Tom expected to be seized and carried off, but the man turned away again as soon as he had identified him.
This gave Tom a little more courage. "What do you want me for?" he ventured to ask.
"Oh, you'll know all in good time, my man," said the policeman, turning to his aunt and whispering something to her.
"You can go back, Tom," she said, turning and speaking over her shoulder.
Tom went back, but he had no more appetite for his tea. He listened intently to what was being said at the street door.
But beyond hearing his aunt say, "Yes, he is sure to be in about ten," which Tom guessed referred to his uncle's return, he could hear nothing.
But he noticed that his aunt locked the street door before she came in, and when he went out to wash himself, he looked and saw that the key was not in the lock as usual, so he concluded that the door had been fastened to keep him in.
He wondered whether they thought he would run away if he had the chance, but turning things over in his mind, Tom decided that if he only stuck to his tale that he had merely lent Jack a shilling, which he repaid with a marked one, nothing else need be known, and surely he could not be blamed for that.