Lady Fleetwood sat confounded, for her mind and her imagination had made great progress during the man's statement. Like a finely-balanced magnetic needle, which has been slightly deranged by some accident, her judgment had wavered about a good deal, but it pointed right at last. First, she came to the conclusion, from the man's speech, that Colonel Middleton was not what he appeared to be, and then that he was certainly Henry Hayley. How to act, what to say, however, she did not know, and all she could utter was--
"Well?--well?"
"Well, as you say, ma'am," rejoined Mr. Mingy Bowes, "the matter, no doubt, will be easily settled; for my friend, who found the book, is quite inclined to be reasonable. He's quite a shy, timid young man, and he asked me to arrange the matter for him. 'You know, Bowes,' he said to me, 'when one has got hold of such a secret as this, it is all fair that he should make something out of it; but I don't want to behave at all unhandsome, so I wish you would go and see what can be done, and I'll content myself with a trifle, Bowes,' he said."
"Is your name Bowes?" asked Lady Fleetwood, who, as I have before remarked, had a terrible habit of darting off at a tangent.
"Yes, ma'am," replied her visiter; "my name is Bowes--Mingy Bowes, at your service."
"It's a very good name," said Lady Fleetwood; "there was a Mr. Bowes I used to know very well, who lived down near Durham. I wonder if you are any relations."
"No, ma'am; none at all," answered Mingy Bowes; "I never had no relations at all."
"Oh, dear, yes; you must have had some relations at some time;" and Lady Fleetwood set hard to work to prove to Mr. Bowes, that at some time or another he must have had some relations, if nothing better than a father and mother--a fact which he did not attempt to controvert, but returned at once, like a man of business, to the more immediate subject of discourse.
Lady Fleetwood's little excursion, however, had done her good. It had suffered her mind to repose and compose itself; and if she made any mistakes now, it was not because she was agitated and confused.
"Well, you see, my lady," continued Mingy Bowes, "I said to the gentleman who found the book, 'Why don't you go yourself?' 'No, no,' says he; 'you go: I only want what's fair, and I'll leave you to judge of that;' so then I said to him, 'What would you think of a thousand pounds?' So then he answered, 'Well, that will do, though it ought to be fifteen hundred.'"