"No," he answered, "I am not his friend." Then, after a pause, "But I have an order to see him. Besides, I have just heard him discussed by a company of wardens in a pot-house on the hill."
"Who were they? What were they like?"
"A tall man, one of them, fifty-five years of age, gray hair, grizzly beard, dark, vindictive eyes, a gash on one cheek, and a voice like a crow's."
"Humph! Jim-the-ladder—a discharged soldier."
"Another, a cadaverous fellow, with a plausible tongue."
"Horrocks—an old second-classer; served his time at Dartmoor and got promotion—doubtful official discipline."
"They both deserve one more and much higher promotion," said Hugh Ritson, with emphasis.
"You mean this." The doctor laughed, and put the forefinger of one hand, held horizontally, to the tip of the other, held upright.
"Can it be possible that the law is unable to maintain a fair stand-up fight with crime, and must needs call a gang of poltroons and blackmailers to its assistance?"
"You heard a bad account of B 2001, I judge?"