Perhaps Mr. Datchery had heard something of what had occurred there last winter?
Mr. Datchery had as confused a knowledge of the event in question, on trying to recall it, as he well could have. He begged Mrs. Tope’s pardon when she found it incumbent on her to correct him in every detail of his summary of the facts, but pleaded that he was merely a single buffer getting through life upon his means as idly as he could, and that so many people were so constantly making away with so many other people as to render it difficult for a buffer of an easy temper to preserve the circumstances of the several cases unmixed in his mind.
Nearly all the conversation between the Mayor and Datchery is deleted. See page 9.
Also Dickens erases the little talk between the Deputy and Datchery beginning: ‘Master Deputy, what do you owe me?’ See page 11.
It may not be possible to deduce any assured inference from these omissions, but they are worth pondering, and may be referred to again.
CHAPTER VII—OTHER THEORIES
THE DROOD-DATCHERY THEORY
One opposing theory is that Datchery was Drood. With all respect for the scholars who have propounded it, this appears to me a purely comic notion. It is the most fantastical of all fancies as to who was Datchery. As Dr. Blake Odgers points out, every one at Cloisterham knew the murdered man: a mere white wig would be no disguise at all. I may add that if Jasper had discovered him he would almost be justified in finishing the murder this time. For what would be Drood’s object? The theory is that, in spite of his being drugged, throttled, perhaps thrown from a tower, at all events buried in quicklime, and in all probability locked up in the tomb, Drood got away when his uncle was triumphantly flinging his watch and scarf-pin into the river. Supposing it were so, what was Drood doing while he watched his uncle? Is it said that he was so bemused by the opium that he did not know who had handled him in such a murderous fashion? This is very hard to believe. Mr. Andrew Lang himself says: ‘Fancy can suggest no reason why Edwin Drood, if he escaped from his wicked uncle, should go spying about instead of coming openly forward.’ Mr. Archer says the flaw is that the theory provides no motive whatever for Drood’s disguising himself as Datchery. Why should Drood devote himself to an elaborate scheme of revenge upon his near kinsman and friend? He would want to hush the matter up, and save Jasper from himself. Why did Drood let Neville lie under the suspicion of murder, and why was not Rosa let into the secret? It is hardly worth while to point out that there is nothing in Drood’s character as given us which could have enabled him to show the ability, the composure, and the self-control of Datchery. Who could have supplied him with money to live idly at Cloisterham? His money was all locked up till he came of age, and Jasper was his guardian and trustee. If Grewgious supplied the money, why did not Grewgious make an end of Neville’s misery?
THE BAZZARD-DATCHERY THEORY
A far more plausible theory is that Datchery was Bazzard. Dickens almost invites readers to connect Bazzard with Datchery when he makes Grewgious say to Rosa when she came up to London that Bazzard ‘was off duty here altogether just at present, and a firm downstairs with whom I have business relations lend me a substitute.’ (The words ‘here altogether’ were added by Dickens.)
I have no doubt that Dickens in some way meant to explain Bazzard’s business. But that Bazzard should have been Datchery will appear a sheer impossibility to careful students of Dickens. Proctor, whose side remarks are often excellent, puts the point briefly as follows: ‘No one at all familiar with Dickens’s method would for a moment imagine that Datchery is Bazzard, Mr. Grewgious’s clerk. Bazzard was as certainly intended to come to grief, and be exposed in the sequel as was Silas Wegg in Our Mutual Friend.’