“Why, sir, the truth is, as I’m a living man,—and this is entirely between us for the present, sir,—’tis a secret I’ve kept for a long time, and if I didn’t feel I could rely on you as a gentleman with a particular interest in Mr. Foxwell—”
“Certainly you can rely on me,—no fears on that score. But what the deuce has this to do with Foxwell? Come, out with it, man! I can keep a secret as well as the best.”
“Well, sir, thanking you kindly for your assurance, the truth is, the footpads hadn’t got the money before they ran away. At least they hadn’t got all of it, or so much but that a considerable amount was left.”
“How, then, if the servant found it was all gone?”
“Simply that those two gentlemen, having suffered heavy losses that night, being in all likelihood at their wits’ end for a further supply of the needful, and finding his lordship’s pockets lined with the same, had succumbed to the temptation of an instant, and transferred the shiners from his pockets to their own while the servant still lay senseless on the ground.”
“The devil you say?” exclaimed the Squire.
“A shocking thing, sir, no doubt,—robbery of the dead. It has a singularly bad sound when put that way, for some reason or other, has it not? So ungentlemanly a crime, if I may presume to offer an opinion, sir.”
“A devilish risky one, too, I should say.”
“Why, no, sir, I should think a particularly safe one on this occasion. The servant and the linkboy could both testify to the attack by the footpads, and it would be taken as certain—just as everybody did take it—that the footpads had succeeded in their purpose before they fled.”
“Ay, but the footpads themselves knew they hadn’t. They had only to come forward and say as much.”