The day will come

by M. E. Braddon

“Did he live in his chambers all that time?”

“Well, sir, nominally he did, but actually he didn’t. He had his bedroom and his bath-room, just as you have; and the rooms was furnished pretty comfortable, and everything about them was very neat, for he was uncommonly particular, was Mr. Dalbrook; and he was always there of a day, and all day long, except when he was at the law courts, for there never was a more persevering gentleman. But after the first three years I can’t say that he lived in Ferret Court. He came there by nine or ten o’clock every morning; and sometimes he stayed till ten o’clock at night, and sometimes he left as early as five in the afternoon; but he didn’t live there no more after the third year, when he was beginning to get on a bit. There was his rooms, and there was nothing altered, except that he took away his dressing-case and a good many of his clothes; but there was everything left that he wanted for his toilet, and all in apple-pie order for him to fall back upon his old ways at any time. Only, as I said before, he didn’t live there no longer; and instead of having his dinner in his own room at seven o’clock, he never took anything more than a biscuit and a glass of sherry, or a brandy and soda.”

“Did this change in his habits come about suddenly?”

“Yes, sir, it did; without an hour’s warning. I comes to his rooms one morning and finds that his bed hasn’t been slept in, and I finds a little bit of a pencil note from him to say that he would be stopping out of town for a few days. He was away over a fortnight, and from that time to the end of my service in Ferret Court, he never spent another night there.”

“He had taken lodgings out of town, I conclude? I suppose you knew his other address?”

“No, sir, he never told me where his home was, for of course he must have had a home somewhere. No man would be a waif and stray for all those years—above all, such a steady-going gentleman as Mr. Dalbrook. I’ve heard other gentlemen accuse him of being a hermit. ‘One never sees you nowhere,’ they says. ‘You’re as steady as Old Time,’ they says. And so he was; but he was very secret with his steadiness.”

“Had you any idea where that second home of his was—in what part of the suburbs? It could not have been very far from London, since you say he came to his chambers before ten o’clock every morning.”

“It was oftener nine than ten, sir,” said Mrs. Dugget.

She paused a little before replying to his question, watching him with a sly smile as he caressed the obtrusive cat. She had her own notions as to the motive of his curiosity. He had expectations from Lord Cheriton, perhaps, and he wanted to discover if there were anything in the background of his kinsman’s history which was likely to interfere with the fruition of his mercenary hopes.

“It was a good many years after Mr. Dalbrook left off sleeping at his chambers that I made a sort of discovery,” she said; “and I knew my place too well to take any advantage of that discovery. But still I had my suspicions, and I believe they were not far off the truth.”