Witness to the Deed

by George Manville Fenn

“Glad of it, sir. You’ll excuse me. You know that sort of thing happens here so often that we’re obliged to keep a sharp lookout.”

Stratton’s mind was made up once more, and he hastened off to the station, caught a later train, and in two hours was down in the old village, with its quaint ivy-covered hostelry and horse-trough ornamented with the mossy growth that dotted the boles of the grand old forest trees around.

The landlady met him with a smile of welcome which faded after his questions.

Oh, yes, she remembered Mr Brettison, and his green tin candle-box and bright trowel very well. He was the gentleman who used to bring home weeds in his umbrella; but it was a long time since he had been down there. It was only a week ago that she was saying to her master how she wondered that that gentleman had not been down for so long. But wouldn’t he come in and have some refreshment?

No, Stratton would not come in and have some refreshment, for he went back to town instantly.

This was an example of many such blind ventures; all carried out in the face of the feeling of despair which racked him; and the time glided on, with hope goading him to fresh exertions in the morning, despair bidding him, in the darkness of the night, give up, and accept his fate.

In course of time, Stratton visited every place in England that he could recall as one of Brettison’s haunts, but always with the same result; and then in a blind, haphazard way, he began to wander about town.

The consequence was that he was rarely at his rooms, and letter after letter was left for him by Guest, who reiterated his demands to see him, and asked for appointments in vain.

But, in spite of the constant checks to which he was subjected, the desire to find his old friend only increased; and, after sitting half the night thinking what to do next, Stratton would snatch a few hours’ sleep, and start off again, feeling sure that he had hit upon the right clue at last.

For there was always some place that he had not searched. The greater museums and institutes he had visited again and again, and at all hours, hoping to find the old man buried in some book, or closely examining some specimen; but the minor places only came to mind by degrees, and day succeeded day in which he went about, haggard and weary-eyed, always looking for the slight, grey old man from whom he had parted on what was to have been his wedding day.