“I beg yours, Colonel Severn, for the interruption.”
“Now then, my man,” continued the Colonel; “you took this visitor, this Professor Barclay—”
There was a low, indignant murmur here, and the Colonel looked round sharply.
“You took this Professor Barclay into your master’s study, I understand, and gave him pens, ink, and paper, and left him to write the letter?”
“No, sir, that I didn’t,” said Wrench, grinning with triumph. “I have been a servant too many years, sir, to go and do a thing like that. What, take him into master’s room, where he keeps his cash-box and cheque-book in the little iron safe in the closet! And there’s the presentation clock on the chimney-piece, and his old gold watch that he never wears in the table-drawer! No, sir. That gentleman was master’s friend to some extent; but he was a stranger to me, and if he’d been a royal duke I shouldn’t have done it.”
“Then, what did you do?” said the Colonel.
“Took him into the theaytre lecture-room, sir, where there’s little tables, and the young gentlemen writes out their exercises. That’s what I did, sir,” said Wrench triumphantly; and he looked hard at his master, who sat shaking his head at him solemnly.—“What! Wasn’t that right, sir?” cried Wrench.
“Oh Wrench, Wrench, Wrench!” said the Doctor. “And you left him there, with the staircase close at hand leading right up to the corridor and the young gentlemen’s dormitories?”
Wrench’s jaw dropped, and one hand went slowly up to the back of his head and began to scratch.
“Well,” continued the Colonel; “and how long did this gentleman stay?”