“What wrong?” she asked.
Harry hung his head a little lower. “I sold Master Dandy, Miss; I gave him up to the police, when he might have escaped; I put them on his track.”
“You! But I thought——”
“Oh yes, Miss,” he said bitterly, glancing up at her—“I know what you thought; I know what every one thought. You believed that I loved him, and was devoted to him. So I was; I would have died for him; I would die now to undo what I did that night. But I was mad, Miss Barnshaw; I felt that he had done me a wrong, and I forgot—forgot all the rest. But now—now I want to put things right—to help him if I can—to prove his innocence.”
“Yes—yes—he is innocent, Harry; there can be no question about that,” she said firmly. “I believe that with all my heart.”
“And so do I, Miss Barnshaw,” replied the lad. “I feel now that he could never have struck down an unprotected girl—I know that, whatever mystery there may be about it all, the Master Dandy we know could never have done that deed. And there is a man here, Miss, a man I met by accident, who knows him, and who has some strange story to tell about him. I could make nothing of it myself, so I brought him here, in the hope that you would see him, Miss, and try to get the story from him. He has been babbling about twins—and there being two of them (two Dandy Chaters, he seemed to mean, Miss)—and one dead, and the other living.”
She looked at him in perplexity for a moment, and then, following the direction of his eyes, and of a hasty movement he made towards the door, opened it swiftly, and looked into the hall. She beckoned to Cripps, who got up somewhat diffidently, and came into the room.
He had had time to think about the matter while he sat alone in the hall. Having a deadly fear of Ogledon, and of his own connection with those shady characters at Woolwich, he had come to the conclusion that the less he said the better would it be for him. At the same time, he wanted money; and, if this woman wanted information, she must pay for it, no matter how meagre that information might be. Putting on an air of deep humility, he faced the girl, hat in hand, and waited for her to speak.
“I am told,” she said at last, in a low voice, “that you have something to tell me, concerning Mr. Dandy Chater—something that may help him—perhaps save him from the fate which seems to be sweeping down upon him. Will you tell me what you know?”
Cripps moistened his lips with his tongue—looked all round the room—looked into his hat—and finally raised his eyes to her face. “Owing to circumstances I cannot explain, my dear young lady,” he said, in his weak treble—“I run a very great risk in telling you anything; so great a risk that—I hardly know how to put the matter—that it will be necessary for you—or any one else—to make it worth my while to say anything.”