“Mighty still there, in that hole, them two mice I let in;—humph!”
Suddenly, at the further end of the gallery, he discerned a shadowy figure emerging from the archway there, and running on before an officer, and impetuously approaching where the turnkey stood.
“More relations coming. These wind-broken chaps are always in before the second death, seeing they always miss the first.—Humph! What a froth the fellow’s in?—Wheezes worse than me!”
“Where is she?” cried Fred Tartan, fiercely, to him; “she’s not at the murderer’s rooms! I sought the sweet girl there, instant upon the blow; but the lone dumb thing I found there only wrung her speechless hands and pointed to the door;—both birds were flown! Where is she, turnkey? I’ve searched all lengths and breadths but this. Hath any angel swept adown and lighted in your granite hell?”
“Broken his wind, and broken loose, too, aint he?” wheezed the turnkey to the officer who now came up.
“This gentleman seeks a young lady, his sister, someway innocently connected with the prisoner last brought in. Have any females been here to see him?”
“Oh, ay,—two of ’em in there now;” jerking his stumped thumb behind him.
Fred darted toward the designated cell.
“Oh, easy, easy, young gentleman”—jingling at his huge bunch of keys—“easy, easy, till I get the picks—I’m housewife here.—Hallo, here comes another.”
Hurrying through the same archway toward them, there now rapidly advanced a second impetuous figure, running on in advance of a second officer.