“No,” I said, “not that she wouldn’t recognize, because she’s looked through my album over and over again, and I can’t borrow one of anybody in the village, because she’d recognize that too. She knows everybody’s business.”
“Oh, leave it to me, sir,” said the Swedish gentleman; “I’ll manage to get one.”
So he went out and got a photograph, and I heard afterwards how he got it. He certainly was very clever at scheming and planning, seeming to like it.
He went to the photographers in the nearest town to us and asked if they had any photographs of celebrities, and they said, “No; there was no demand for them.” Then he asked if they had any photographs of anybody who didn’t live in the place or near the place. The photographer thought a minute, and then said, “Yes; he thought he had.” He went to a drawer, and brought out a photograph of a man.
“I’m sure that is a stranger,” he said; “you can have this.” The Swedish gentleman had said he wanted an old photograph to do a conjuring trick with, but didn’t want anybody who was an inhabitant.
He paid a shilling for the photo, and brought it back. When he got near our house he met Mr. Saxon, who had gone out for a stroll, and that blessed Mrs. Croker was watching for him, and was on to him again demanding particulars of her husband’s death in Australia and of her fortune. She wasn’t going to let a lot of people that had no claim on him get it.
Mr. Saxon asked the Swedish gentleman in German if he’d got a photo. “Yes,” he said.
Then Mr. Saxon turned to Mrs. Croker and said, “Madam, I suppose you would know your husband’s photograph?”
“Yes, I should,” she said.
“Then, madam, my friend will show you the photograph of our Mr. Smith, and you will see it is not your husband.”