"Perhaps the police know that Monsieur Osborne did not kill her," he managed to say in a muffled tone.
"Oh, là, là!" cried the woman. "He has money, ce vilain Osborne!"
The ironic phrase was pitiless. It denounced, condemned, explained. Rupert forced a laugh.
"Truly, money can do almost anything," he said.
A detective came out of the passage, laden with dilapidated packages. The woman smiled broadly, saying:
"My faith, they do not prosper, those Anarchists."
Rupert edged his way through the crowd. On the opposite side of the street the contents bills of the early editions of the evening newspapers glared at him: "West End murder—Relatives sail from Jersey." "Portrait sketch of Osborne"; "Paris Life of Rose de Bercy"; the horror of it all suddenly stifled his finer impulses: from that hour Rupert squared his shoulders and meant to scowl at the jeering multitude.
Probably because he was very rich, he cultivated simple tastes in the matter of food. At one o'clock he ate some fruit and a cake or two, drank a glass of milk, and noticed that the girl in the cashier's desk was actually looking at his own "portrait sketch" when he tendered her a shilling. About half-past one he took a hansom to Waterloo Station, where he bought a map and railway guide at the bookstall, and soon decided that Tormouth on the coast of Dorset offered some prospect of a quiet anchorage.
So, when Jenkins came with a couple of new leather bags, Rupert bought a third-class ticket. Traveling in a corridor compartment, he heard the Feldisham Mansions crime discussed twice during the afternoon. Once he was described as a "reel bad lot—one of them fellers 'oo 'ad too little to do an' too much to do it on." When, at Winchester, these critics alighted, their places were taken by a couple of young women; and the train had hardly started again before the prettier of the two called her companion's attention to a page in an illustrated paper.
"Poor thing! Wasn't she a beauty?" she asked, pointing to a print of the Academy portrait of Mademoiselle de Bercy.