“The more I can find out about him and his habits,” Sellars remarked, “the more it seems unlikely, although not, of course, impossible, that he should have done this thing. As far as I can learn, he has been in love with Miss Sheldon for years, and his life has simply been bound up with the Morrice family. They entertained very largely, and he always showed up at their entertainments, was at every dinner-party they gave, just like a son of the house. He seems to have very few young men friends, but they are all of a most respectable type. He doesn’t gamble, he doesn’t drink. Other women don’t come into the case, for he is hardly ever a yard away from his lady-love. Does he seem the kind of man to get himself into a hole out of which he can only extricate himself by robbery?”
And Lane was forced to agree that if the good report of one’s fellows could establish innocence, young Richard Croxton was already satisfactorily whitewashed. But of course, in the opinion of this eminent practitioner, all this was negative evidence, not positive.
Rosabelle, who was duly informed of the loss of the original memorandum—for Lane was at bottom a very kind-hearted man and thought he could give the harassed girl this crumb of comfort without jeopardizing his future action—was very jubilant. She was also pleased that her uncle had appointed the detective to prosecute his investigations on his behalf. It would mean that Lane would not be hampered for money.
She went over to Petersham the next day to tell her lover what had happened, and succeeded in infecting him with her own hopeful spirit.
“And is Mr. Morrice still as bitter against me as ever, does he still believe as firmly in my guilt?”
Rosabelle was not very sure of the financier’s real thoughts, but she gave the best answer she could.
“You know, my dear old Dick, how obstinately he clings to an idea when he has once taken it into his head, but I fancy he is a bit shaken.”
CHAPTER XII
SIR GEORGE’S VALET
In a back street behind the busy thoroughfare of Piccadilly there is a small, quiet-looking public-house which is a great rendezvous for male servants of a superior class. Thither in their leisure moments repair chauffeurs, butlers, valets in good service, to take a moderate amount of refreshment—such men seldom drink to excess—to chat over the news of the day, and very frequently to comment to each other on the characters and doings of their employers.
On the evening following the day on which Lane had held that long conversation with Mr. Morrice recorded in the last chapter, two men sat in a corner of the snug little bar, drinking whisky and soda and talking together in confidential tones.