“What!—Saw him, and spoke to him, and not got him?”
“Why—why—your worship he looks a powerful villain.”
“Sir, I’m afraid you are a great coward,” said Sir Francis. “What do you mean by coming to me, and saying you have seen and spoken to a criminal? I don’t know but it’s my duty to commit you for aiding, abetting, and comforting a man accused of one of the most heinous crimes in the calendar.”
“Commit me?”
“Yes—you.”
“I come here to—to—ask your worship to—to—let me have an officer to go with me to try to find him.”
“Sir, my officers will find him themselves, only some caution is requisite, as he belongs to a gang who have bound themselves by a solemn oath to barbarously murder any person who may be at all instrumental in the capture of any of their body.”
“Eh? You—you—really—then I should have been murdered?”
“I dare say you would, but I hope when you see him again that you will take him; and when you are dead, the reward shall be paid to any one you may appoint in your will, which I think you had better make here at once in my office in case of accidents. Two of my officers shall witness it.”
“No—no—I—I—God bless me. What danger I have been in, to be sure. Gracious! If I see him again, I shall knock at some door and ask to be let in till he is gone. I—I—I’ll run into a shop—I’ll leave London till some one else has taken him.”