In the middle of the night, being wakeful, she had an odd recollection of the pinched face under the shabby bowler. And now she remembered where she had seen the man before. Why, only half an hour had elapsed between the first and second encounter! For she had noticed him on the opposite pavement as she was leaving Aberdare Mansions.
“The beast followed me!” she thought suddenly.
CHAPTER XV
“You bungler!”
Mr. Symington’s countenance was sickly; his voice was full of cold and bitter disgust.
The wretched Corrie had come to the end of his sorry confession, not without interruptions mainly of an angry, abusive nature. And now the verdict—“You bungler!” Somehow it stung most of all.
“It’s easy to call names,” he rejoined resentfully. “I’m no’ the only bungler. If ever a man let a girl slip through his fingers it was you. Ye should ha’ had her easy that night—while she was terrified—after she had taken the post office money—”
“I don’t believe she took any money—”
“Then how could she pay her fare to London?”
“Probably the postman lent—gave—her it.”