“I declare I shall go mad if I hear that again!” interrupted Roland, turning red with passion. “It makes me wild. Everybody’s on with it. ‘You—are—very—kind—to—take—up—Arthur Channing’s—cause!’ they mince out. Incorrigible idiots! Kind! Why, Mr. Channing, if that cat of yours there, were to be accused of swallowing down a mutton chop, and you felt morally certain that she did not do it, wouldn’t you stand up for her against punishment?”
Mr. Channing could not forbear a smile at Roland and his hot championship. “To be ‘morally certain’ may do when cats are in question, Mr. Roland; but the law, unfortunately, requires something more for us, the superior animal. No father living has had more cause to put faith in his children than I. The unfortunate point in this business is, that the loss appears to have occurred so mysteriously, when the letter was in Arthur’s charge.”
“Yes, if it had occurred that way; but who believes it did, except a few pates with shallow brains?” retorted Roland. “The note is burning a hole in the pocket of some poor, ill-paid wight of a letter-carrier; that’s where the note is. I beg your pardon, Mr. Channing, but it’s of no use to interrupt me with arguments about old Galloway’s seal. They go in at one ear and out at the other. What more easy than to put a penknife under the seal, and unfasten it?”
“You cannot do this where gum is used as well: as it was to that letter.”
“Who cares for the gum!” retorted Mr. Roland. “I don’t pretend to say, sir, how it was accomplished, but I know it must have been done somehow. Watch a conjuror at his tricks! You can’t tell how he gets a shilling out of a box which you yourself put in—all you know is, he does get it out; or how he exhibits some receptacle, crammed full, which you could have sworn was empty. Just so with the letter. The bank-note did get out of it, but we can’t tell how, except that it was not through Arthur. Come along, old fellow, or Galloway may be blowing us up for arriving late.”
Twitching Tom’s hair as he passed him, treading on the cat’s tail, and tossing a branch of sweetbriar full of thorns at Annabel, Mr. Roland Yorke made his way out in a commotion. Arthur, yielding to the strong will, followed. Roland passed his arm within his, and they went towards Close Street.
“I say, old chum, I haven’t had a wink of sleep all night, worrying over this bother. My room is over Lady Augusta’s, and she sent up this morning to know what I was pacing about for, like a troubled ghost. I woke at four o’clock, and I could not get to sleep after; so I just stamped about a bit, to stamp the time away.”
In a happier mood, Arthur might have laughed at his Irish talk, “I am glad you stand by me, at any rate, Yorke. I never did it, you know. Here comes Williams. I wonder in what light he will take up the affair? Perhaps he will turn me from my post at the organ.”
“He had better!” flashed Roland. “I’d turn him!”
Mr. Williams appeared to “take up the affair” in a resentful, haughty sort of spirit, something like Roland, only that he was quieter over it. He threw ridicule upon the charge. “I am astonished at Galloway!” he observed, when he had spoken with them some moments. “Should he go on with the case, the town will cry shame upon him.”