“Ye're rightly served for meddling,” said he with relish.
“Out with them,” the chubby man demanded. “Ye'll gain nothing by resistance. So don't be obstinate, now.”
“I could be nothing so discourteous,” said Mr. Caryll. “Would it be prying on my part to inquire what may be your interest in my papers?”
His serenity lessened the earl's anxieties, but bewildered him; and it took the edge off the malicious pleasure which Rotherby was beginning to experience.
“I am obeying the orders of my Lord Carteret, the Secretary of State,” said Mr. Green. “I was to watch for a gentleman from France with letters for my Lord Ostermore. He had a messenger a week ago to tell him to look for such a visitor. He took the messenger, if you must know, and—well, we induced him to tell us what was the message he had carried. There is so much mystery in all this that my Lord Carteret desires more knowledge on the subject. I think you are the gentleman I am looking for.”
Mr. Caryll looked him over with an amused eye, and laughed. “It distresses me,” said he, “to see so much good thought wasted.”
Mr. Green was abashed a moment. But he recovered quickly; no doubt he had met the cool type before. “Come, come!” said he. “No blustering. Out with your papers, my fine fellow.”
The door opened, and a couple of men came in; over their shoulders, ere the door closed again, Mr. Caryll had a glimpse of the landlady's rosy face, alarm in her glance. The newcomers were dirty rogues; tipstaves, recognizable at a glance. One of them wore a ragged bob-wig—the cast-off, no doubt, of some gentleman's gentleman, fished out of the sixpenny tub in Rosemary Lane; it was ill-fitting, and wisps of the fellow's own unkempt hair hung out in places. The other wore no wig at all; his yellow thatch fell in streaks from under his shabby hat, which he had the ill-manners to retain until Lord Ostermore knocked it from his head with a blow of his cane. Both were fierily bottle-nosed, and neither appeared to have shaved for a week or so.
“Now,” quoth Mr. Green, “will you hand them over of your own accord, or must I have you searched?” And a wave of the hand towards the advancing myrmidons indicated the searchers.
“You go too far, sir,” blustered the earl.