“Where did I leave him? I didn’t leave him anywhere. He left me.”
“Where was it?”
“On the road.”
“Did he tell you where he expected to spend the night?”
“He might, and again he mightn’t. I am so forgetful that I never minds what’s told me. It just goes into one ear and out of the other.”
Finding he could get no certain information out of the carrier, Simon started to go, threatening him with arrest for conniving at the escape of Vivian Bell.
“You don’t really think your pa would have me arrested, do you, Simon?” asked the carrier, pretending to be very much frightened.
“You just see!”
“You’ll speak a good word for me, won’t you? You see it would be bad for my business to be arrested.”
“You ought to have thought of that,” said Simon, under the impression that Jack was weakening. “Your only course is to tell pa all you know about Bell, and just where he’s gone.”