There was something so perfectly reasonable in all this, that Harvey stepped into an adjoining parlor, and threw open his trunk for inspection, never doubting that his innocence would be immediately manifest.
The waiter, whose mean rapacity had been the cause of the detention, acted as examiner. He pulled one article after another out of the trunk, and at length—horror of horrors!—held up the missing watch with a look of triumph and scorn!
"Who put that there?" cried Harvey in an agony of mind which can be better imagined than described. "Who has done me this grievous wrong? I know nothing as to how the watch came into my trunk."
No one answered this appeal. All present stood for a moment in gloomy silence.
"Sir," said the landlord to Harvey on recovering from his surprise, "I am sorry for you. For the sake of a miserable trifle, you have brought ruin and disgrace on yourself. This is a matter which concerns the honor of my house, and cannot stop here. However much it is against my feelings, you must go before a magistrate."
"By all means," added No. 17, with the importance of an injured man. "A pretty thing that one's watch is not safe in a house like this!"
"John, send Boots for a constable," said the landlord.
Harvey sat with his head leaning on his hand. A deadly cold perspiration trickled down his brow. His heart swelled and beat as if it would burst. What should he do? His whole prospects were in an instant blighted. "Oh God! do not desert a frail and unhappy being: give me strength to face this new and terrible misfortune," was a prayer he internally uttered. A little revived, he started to his feet, and addressing himself to the landlord, he said, "Take me to a magistrate instantly, and let us have this diabolical plot unraveled. I court inquiry into my character and conduct."
"It is no use saying any more about it," answered the landlord; "here is Boots with a constable, and let us all go away together to the nearest magistrate. Boots, carry that trunk. John and Sally, you can follow us."
And so the party, trunk and all, under the constable as conductor, adjourned to the house of a magistrate in an adjacent street. There the matter seemed so clear a case of felony—robbery in a dwelling-house—that Harvey, all protestations to the contrary, was fully committed for trial at the ensuing March assizes, then but a few days distant.