The man regarded Miss Strong with an inquiring eye.
"I don't know you, miss. Mr. Ireland, who's the lady?"
"The lady's all right. She's a bit interested in the Datchet diamonds herself. If she says she'll give you fifty pounds you'll get 'em, only you've got to earn 'em, mind!"
"Fifty pound!" The man drew a long breath.
"I'd do pretty nigh anything for fifty pound, let alone the way they've been and used me. I've been having a cruel hard time, I have--cruel hard!"
Ireland took Cooper by the shoulder and shook him, with the apparent intention of waking him up.
"All right, Mr. Ireland, all right; there ain't no call for you to go handling of me; I ain't doing nothing to you. I don't know the lady, and she don't know me, and I'm only a-trying to see that's it's all right. You wouldn't do a pore bloke, miss, would you? That fifty'll be all right?"
Mr. Ireland presented Cooper with a second application of the previous dose.
"That fifty'll be all right, or rather it'll be all wrong, if you keep me standing here much longer in the rain."
"You are so hasty, Mr. Ireland, upon my word you are. I'm a-coming to it, ain't I? Now I'll tell you straight. Tom the Toff, he done the nicking; and the Baron, he put him up to it." Miss Strong looked bewildered.