“And it might strike me that you wouldn’t,” retorted Blick, with a sly glance at his man. “I’ve learnt a good deal since I came into these parts. You’d a pretty good grudge against Guy Markenmore yourself, eh?”
Roper scowled more darkly than before.
“Don’t know nothing certain about how he come by his end, anyhow,” he muttered. “And as to grudges, there’s them around here as knows how that varmint treated I! Ain’t a decent man, same as what I’ve been, a right to have his feelings about another man as treated him bad?”
“You’ve the same right to your feelings that every other man has,” agreed Blick. “Who says you haven’t?”
Roper looked somewhat mollified.
“Well,” he remarked slowly, “’cause o’ such feelings as I do have, I ’oodn’t ha’ lifted a finger to presarve that man! He got what such-like desarves! But I ain’t no, what you might call certain idea whatever who he got it from.”
“You mean—if it comes to precise particulars,” insinuated Blick. “But now look here, Roper. You knock about a good deal round this part, early and late, and I guess you’ve a pair of sharp eyes and a pair of sharp ears as well. Guy Markenmore’s dead!—good riddance to him, if you like!—I don’t care, I’m sure. But what’s it matter if you, if you have any knowledge of any sort about him, just before his death, if you let it out—especially if it’s made worth your while? For instance—in going about, as you do, have you ever seen anything suspicious, or met any suspicious characters? Have you ever heard or seen anything out of the common?”
Roper looked from one visitor to another. The Professor, smoking a cigar, was watching him attentively.
“Ain’t heard nothing about it’s being worth anybody’s while to tell anything as they might chance to know,” said Roper suddenly.
Blick silently drew out his copy of the reward bill and handed it to the woodman; the Professor, keenly attentive, saw Roper’s eyes brighten at sight of the heavy type in which the particulars of Mrs. Braxfield’s reward were printed. He drew his heavy brows together as he laboriously read through the offer.