‘Now, Mrs Henderson, perhaps you’ll tell us what all this means. Who is this man, and how did he come in here, and who came in with him, and what do you know about it altogether? If you’ve got anything to say, say it, only you’d better be careful, because it’s my duty to warn you that anything you do say may be used against you.’
CHAPTER XLV.
ALL THAT MRS ’ENDERSON KNEW
Mrs Henderson put her hands under her apron and smirked.
‘Well, Mr Phillips, it do sound strange to ’ear you talkin’ to me like that. Anybody’d think I’d done something as I didn’t ought to ’a’ done to ’ear you going on. As for what’s ’appened, I’ll tell you all I know with the greatest willingness on earth. And as for bein’ careful, there ain’t no call for you to tell me to be that, for that I always am, as by now you ought to know.’
‘Yes,—I do know. Is that all you have to say?’
‘Rilly, Mr Phillips, what a man you are for catching people up, you rilly are. O’ course that ain’t all I’ve got to say,—ain’t I just a-comin’ to it?’
‘Then come.’
‘If you presses me so you’ll muddle of me up, and then if I do ’appen to make a herror, you’ll say I’m a liar, when goodness knows there ain’t no more truthful woman not in Limehouse.’
Words plainly trembled on the Inspector’s lips,—which he refrained from uttering. Mrs Henderson cast her eyes upwards, as if she sought for inspiration from the filthy ceiling.
‘So far as I can swear it might ’ave been a hour ago, or it might ’ave been a hour and a quarter, or it might ’ave been a hour and twenty minutes—’