They decided to consult Betty Siggs forthwith; and, although that lady was at first very chary of holding any communication with Cripps, she cheerfully accepted Philip’s assurance that the little man was to be trusted, and set about devising a plan to help them. Taking Toby into her confidence, also, she brought him up to the room, where Philip and Cripps were waiting, and they put the case before him.
Toby Siggs thought about it for a long time; turned it over this way and that, but could make nothing of it. Betty, after all, settled the difficulty in her own quick fashion.
She happened to be standing near the window, looking down into the yard at the back of the inn; when she suddenly clapped her hands, and laughed aloud. “’Ere you are!” she exclaimed—“the very thing!”
Philip ran to her side, and looked down into the yard. A heavy wagon, laden with hay, had drawn into the yard, and the carter was at that moment climbing down, ready to enter the house.
“See, dear lad,” whispered Betty—“the man is a stranger, and ’alf a sov’rin will be a fortune to ’im, an’ ’e’ll ask no questions. You ain’t above roughing it—an’ you an’ the other man can creep in under the tarpaulin, and get to town, without no one bein’ any the wiser. It’ll be slow—but it’ll be better than bein’ caught ’arf-way, an’ ’avin’ yer journey for nothin’—won’t it?”
The plan seemed an excellent one; and Betty went downstairs at once to arrange it. The carter, being an easy fellow, earning small wages, was delighted at the prospect of gathering in ten shillings with so little trouble; and, in half an hour Cripps and Philip Chater were lying snugly on top of the sweet-smelling hay, under the tarpaulin, travelling slowly but surely on the road to London.
Cripps was very valiant—in whispers—on the road; professing his ability to run Ogledon to earth, and openly charge him with the murder of Dandy Chater. Repentance was strong upon him for the time, and he was ready to perform impossible deeds, by way of reparation for past misdeeds. In particular, he was anxious about the bank notes which had been handed to Philip at The Three Watermen.
“For of course I know, by this time, Mr. Chater, that they were handed to you,” he said—“and not to the man who is dead. Let me warn you, for your own sake, not to deal in them; they are stopped, and keenly watched for already.”
“The warning comes too late,” replied Philip, with a groan. “I dealt in them almost at once. I had to cover up a—well, call it a mistake—on the part of my late brother, and I paid away the notes as hush-money.”
“To whom did you pay it?”