“Perhaps he was mixed up in it?”
“Oh, no, I hardly think that. She was a strapping lass, and he’s a poor crippled fellow with only one leg. Besides, what should he do it for?”
“Anyhow, where is he to be found?”
“Ah, that’s just what nobody knows. He used to be seen about here often enough, but since that night he’s only been caught sight of once or twice, and then always in company with the same person.”
“And that person is—”
“Mr. Vernon Brander!”
“Thanks. That’ll do for me, I think.”
And with that he left her as abruptly as before, and this time walked straight back to his own dwelling without a pause, or so much as a glance to right or left of him.
For some days after that, the stolid figure of the colonist was missed from the village. People began to think that he had decided that the object of his stay was hopeless, and that he had slunk away quietly to avoid the humiliation of owning that his dogged obstinacy had been beaten. The old woman who swept his rooms and washed up his tea things, though much questioned, could tell nothing. He had paid her up to the day of his departure, and had simply told her that he was going away. But whether for a day, a week, or forever he did not say. No board, however, was put up before the cottage to announce that it was to let; so that speculation was in favor of his return. Martha Lowndes was the only person who rightly guessed on what errand he had gone. She alone would have felt no surprise if she could have followed the track of Ned Mitchell as he wandered about the country spending a day here, three days there, always stolidly unsociable, and yet always contriving to get more information out of his neighbors than the chattiest and cheeriest of travellers could have done. He was tracking a man down with the feeblest of clues—a wooden leg and a Yorkshire accent. But he was gifted with a dogged energy and patience which nothing could daunt, and so in the end he found his man. The place was a common lodging house; the time was three weeks after he started on his search; the man was Abel Squires.
Ned Mitchell, when he found himself face to face with the crippled tramp, thought that his work was practically done—a witness found ready to his hand. But he was mistaken. Luckily for his object, he broached the matter with the caution of a skillful diplomatist, so that Abel had no idea of the interest he took in it. But the Yorkshireman in tatters was as keen and canny on his side as the Yorkshireman in broadcloth was on his; he was impervious to attack, either direct or indirect, and at the mere suggestion of bribery he grew closer than ever. Mitchell, however, did not give up the game, and at last he hit upon the means of opening the tramp’s mouth. Poor Abel had a partiality for strong liquor, and the temptation to indulge in it was more than he could resist. The wily Ned was cautious, and contrived to treat his ragged companion, not wisely but too well without exciting his suspicion. But even under the soft influence of rum and water, the tramp was more difficult to manage than his tempter would have supposed possible. It was not until after a long convivial evening that, Abel’s rough head having fallen at last on to the table in a drunken sleep, Ned Mitchell was able to stand over him and say to himself, with a gleam of savage and doubtful satisfaction breaking through the heavy stolidity of his expression—