"And I suppose the whole affair of the robbery will come out?" observed Curtis interrogatively.
"Decidedly so. You must state the exact truth—if you can," added Mr. Howard.
"If I can! Damn it, old fellow, that observation is not quite the thing—coming from you; and if any body else had uttered it, egad! I'd send him a hostile message to-morrow morning—as I did to my most valued friend, the Marquis of Boulogne, when I was in Paris. I'll just tell you how that was——"
"Not now Frank," interrupted the lawyer; "because I'm very busy. It's getting on for post time—and I have not a minute to spare. But mind and be punctual at the Borough police-office on Monday morning at ten."
"Well—if I must, I must," said Curtis. "But, after all, I think it's rather too bad—for this Sparks, or Rainford, or whatever his name is, seems a good kind of fellow, after all."
"The law must take its course, Frank," observed the attorney in an abrupt, dry manner.
Curtis accordingly took his leave, and returned to his lodgings, where by dint of cold water applied outwardly and soda-water taken inwardly, he endeavoured to sober himself sufficiently to pay a visit to Mrs. Goldberry.
For it was literally true that there was such a lady—that she lived in splendid style in Baker Street—that Frank had proposed to her—and that he had been accepted;—but we have deemed it necessary to give the reader these corroborative assurances on our part, inasmuch as the whole tale would otherwise have appeared nothing more nor less than one of the innumerable children of Mr. Curtis's fertile imagination.
CHAPTER LI.
LORD ELLINGHAM IN THE DUNGEON.
Four weeks had elapsed since the arrest of Tom Rain and the extraordinary adventure which had snatched the Earl of Ellingham from the great world and plunged him into a narrow—noisome cell.