A PRIVATE INTERVIEW.
"PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL.
"CUFF COURT, OFF FLEET STREET. No. 1.
"_October the twenty-second_.
"MR. BEDE GREATOREX.
"SIR,--A small leaf has been turned over in the matter of your cheque,
lost mysteriously in June last. Leastways in something that might turn
out to be connected with it. Remembering back orders, and wishing to
act in accordance with the same, I'd be glad to hold a short interview
with you, and would wait upon you at any hour or place you may
appoint. Or if it suited your convenience to come to me, I am to be
found as above, either this evening or tomorrow evening after seven
o'clock.
"Your obedient servant,
"JONAS BUTTERBY."
The above note, amidst two or three other letters, reached Mr. Bede
Greatorex about four o'clock in the afternoon. He happened to be at
his desk in the front room, and was giving some directions to Mr.
Brown, who stood by him. As Bede ran his eyes over the lines, a deep
flush, a frown, followed by a sickly paleness, overspread his face.
Mr. Brown, looking at him quite by accident, remarked the signs of
displeasurable emotion, and felt curious to know what the news could
be that had caused it. He had, however, no opportunity for prolonged
observation, for Bede, carrying the letter in his hand, went into his
room and shut the door.
The note angered Bede Greatorex as well as troubled him. Who was this
Butterby, that he should be continually crossing his peace? What
brought the man to London?--he had gone back to Helstonleigh in the
summer, and had never, so far as Bede knew, come up from it since. Was
he, Bede, ere he had been a couple of weeks home from his Continental
holiday, to be followed up by this troublesome detective, and his life
made a worry again? In the moment's angry impulse, Bede sat down to
his desk-table, and began dashing off an answer, to the effect that he
could not accord an interview to Mr. Butterby.
But the pen was arrested ere it had completed the first line.
Self-preservation from danger is a feeling implanted more or less
strongly within us all. What if this persistent officer, denied to
him, betook himself and his news to Mr. Greatorex? Bede was as
innocent in regard to the purloining of the cheque and certainly as
ignorant of the really guilty party as Butterby could be; he had
refunded the forty-four pounds with anything but a hand of
gratification; but nevertheless there were grave reasons why the
matter should not be reopened to his father.
Catching up the letter, he paced the carpet for a moment or two in
deep thought; halted by the window, and read it again. "Yes, I'll see
him; it will be safer," said he, with decision.
He wrote a rapid note, appointing eleven o'clock the next morning for
the interview at his own office. And then again paused as he was
folding it; paused in deliberation.
"Why not go to him?" spoke Bede Greatorex, his eyes fixed on the
opposite wall, as if he thought the map there could solve the query.
"Yes, I will; I'll go tonight. That's safest of all."
Noting down the given address, he held M. Butterby's letter and his
own two answers, perfect and imperfect, over the grate lighted a
match, and burnt them to ashes. There was no fire; the weather was
uncertain, warm today, cold tomorrow, and the fire was sometimes let
go out in a morning as soon as lighted.
Evening came. And at ten minutes past seven Bede Greatorex was on the
search for Mr. Butterby. "Cuff Court, Off Fleet Street." He did not
know Cuff Court; and supposed that "Off Fleet Street" might indicate
some turning or winding beginning in that well-known thoroughfare, and
ending it was hard to say where. Bede, however, by dint of inquiry
found Cuff Court at last. No. 1 had the appearance of a small private
house; as in fact it was. The great Butterby generally lodged there
when he came to town. The people residing in it were connections of
his and accommodated him; it was, as he remarked, "convenient to
places."
Bede was shown upstairs to a small sitting-room. At a square table,
examining some papers taken from his open pocketbook, by the light of
two gas-burners over head, sat Jonas Butterby; the same thin wiry man
as ever, in apparently the same black coat, plaid trousers, and
buttoned-up waistcoat; with the same green observant eyes, and
generally silent lips. He pushed the papers and pocketbook away into
a heap when his visitor appeared, and rose to receive him.
"Take a seat, sir," he said, handing a chair by the hearth opposite
his own, and stirring the bit of fire in the grate. "You don't object
to this, I hope: it ain't hardly fire-time yet, but a morsel looks
cheery at night."
"I like it," said Bede. He put his hat on a side-table, and unbuttoned
a thin overcoat he wore, as he sat down, throwing it a little back
from the fine white shirt front, but did not take off his lavender
gloves. It had always struck Mr. Butterby that Bede Greatorex was one
of the finest and most gentlemanly men he knew, invariably dressed
well; it had struck him that far-off time at Helstonleigh, when they
met over John Ollivera's death chair, and it struck him still. But he
was looking ill, worn, anxious; and the detective, full of observation
by habit, could not fail to see it.
"I'm uncommon glad you've come in, Mr. Bede Greatorex. From a fresh
turn some business I'm engaged on has took today, I'm not sure but I
shall have to go back to Helstonleigh the first thing in the morning.
Shall know by late post tonight."
"Are you living in London?"
"Not I. I come up to it only yesterday, expecting to stop a week or
so. Now I find I may have to go back tomorrow: the chances is about
equal one way and t'other. But if I do, I should not have got to see
you this time, sir, and must have come up again for it."
"I felt very much inclined to say I'd not see you," answered Bede,
candidly. "We are busy just now, and I would a great deal rather let
the whole affair relating to the cheque drop entirely, than be at the
trouble of raking it up again. The loss of the money has been ours,
and, of course, we must put up with it. I began a note to you to this
effect; but it struck me while I was writing that you might possibly
be carrying your news to my father."
"No, I shouldn't have done that. It concerns you, so to say, more than
him. Been well lately, Mr. Bede Greatorex?"
"As well as I usually am. Why?"
"Well, sir, you are looking, if I might make bold to say it, something
like a shadder. Might a'most see through you."
"I have been doing too much lately. Mrs. Bede Greatorex and myself
were on the Continent for two months, rushing about from kingdom to
kingdom, and from place to place, seeing the wonders, and taking what
the world calls a holiday--which is more wearing than any hard work,"
Bede condescended to explain, but in rather a haughty tone, for he
thought it did not lie in the detective's legitimate province to offer
remarks upon him. "In regard to business, Mr. Butterby: unless you
have anything very particular to communicate, I would rather not hear
it. Let the affair drop."
"But I should not be doing my duty either way, to you or to me, in
letting it drop," returned Butterby. "If anything worse turned up
later, I might get called over the coals for it at headquarters."
"Be so good as to hasten over what you have to say, then," said Bede,
taking out his watch and looking at it with anything but marked
courtesy.
It produced no effect on Mr. Butterby. If his clients chose to be in a
hurry, he rarely was. But in his wide experience, bringing, as he
generally did, all keen observation to bear, he felt convinced of one
thing--that the gentleman before him _dreaded_ the communication he
had to make, and, for that reason and no other, wished to shun it.
"When that cheque was lost in the summer, Mr. Bede Greatorex, you did
me the honour to put a little matter into my hands, confiding to me
your confident opinion that one of your clerks must have been the
purloiner of it, if not on his own score, on somebody else's that he
was acting for. You asked me to give an eye privately to the four. Not
having got any satisfactory news from me up to the present time, you
have perhaps thought that I have been neglecting the charge, and let
it fall through."
"Oh, if it concerns _them_, I'll be glad to hear you!" briskly spoke
Bede Greatorex; and to the acute ear listening, the tone seemed to
express relief as well as satisfaction. "Have you found out that one
of them did take it?"
"Not exactly. What I have found out, though, tells me that it is not
improbable."
"Go on, please," said Bede impatiently. "Was it Hurst?"
"Now don't you jump to conclusions in haste, Mr. Bede Greatorex; and
you must just pardon me for giving you the advice. It's a good rule to
be observed in all cases; and if you'd been in my part of the law as
long as I have, you'd not need to be told it. My own opinion was, that
young Hurst was not one to help himself to money, or anything else
that wasn't his; but of course when you----"
"Stop an instant," interrupted Bede Greatorex, starting up as a
thought occurred to him, and looking round in alarm. "This house is
small, the walls are no doubt thin; can we be overheard?"
"You may sit down again in peace, sir," was the phlegmatic answer. "It
was a child of twelve, or so, that showed you up, wasn't it?"
"Yes."
"Well, except her, and her missis--who is as deaf as a stone post,
poor thing, though she is my cousin--there's not a living soul in the
house. The husband and son never get home till ten. As to the walls,
they are seven times thicker than some modern ones, for the old house
was built in substantial days. And if not--trust me for being secure
and safe, and my visitors too, wherever I may stop, Mr. Bede
Greatorex."
"It was for Hurst's sake I spoke," said Bede, in the light of a rather
lame apology. "It may suit me to hush it up, even though you tell me
he is guilty."
"When you desired me to look after your clerks, and gave me your
reasons--which I couldn't at first make top nor tail of, and am free
to confess have not got to the bottom of yet--my own judgment was that
young Hurst was about the least likely of all to be guilty," pursued
the officer, in his calmest and coolest manner. "However, as you
persisted in your opinion, I naturally gave in to it, and looked up
Hurst effectually. Or got him looked up; which amounts to the same
thing."
"Without imparting any hint of my reasons for it?" again anxiously and
imperatively interrupted Bede Greatorex. And it nettled the detective.
"I'd like to ask you a question, Mr. Bede Greatorex, and to have it
answered, sir. _Do_ you think I should be fit for my post unless I had
more 'cute discretion about me than ordinary folks, such as--excuse
me--you? Why, my whole work, pretty nigh, is made up of ruses and
secresy, and pitching people off on wrong scents. Says I to my
friend--him that I sets about the job?--'that young Mr. Hurst has been
making a undesirable acquaintance, quite innocent, lately; he may get
drawed into unpleasant consequences afore he knows it; and as I've a
respect for his father, a most skilful doctor of physic, I should like
to warn the young man in time, if there's danger. You just _turn him,
inside out_; watch all he does and all he doesn't do, and let me know
it.' Well, sir, Hurst _was_ turned inside out, so to say; if we'd
stripped his skin off him, we couldn't have seen more completely into
his in'ard self and his doings than we did see; and the result was
(leastways, the opinion I came to), that I was right and you were
wrong. He had no more hand in the taking of that there cheque, or in
any other part of the matters you hinted at, than this pocketbook
here of mine had. And when I tell you that, Mr. Bede Greatorex, you
may believe it."
A short silence ensued. Bede Greatorex's left elbow rested on the
table; his hand, the glove off now, was pressing his temple as if in
reflective thought, the beautiful diamond ring on his little finger
glittering in the gas-light. His mother had given the ring to him when
she was dying, expressing a hope that he would wear it always in
remembrance of her. It appeared to Bede almost as a religious duty to
obey, though few men hated ornaments in connection with himself, so
much as he. His eyes were fixed on the fire; Mr. Butterby's on him.
"Well, Mr. Greatorex, Hurst being put out of the field, I naturally
went on to the others. Jenner I never suspected at all, 'twas not him;
and I felt morally sure, in spite of his impudence to me, that this
time it was not Roland Yorke. Notwithstanding, I looked a little after
both those gents; and I found that it was not either of 'em."
"What do you mean by 'this time' in connection with Mr. Yorke?"
inquired Bede, catching up the words, which, perhaps, had been an
inadvertent slip.
Butterby coughed. But he was not a bad man at heart, and had no
intention of doing gratuitous damage even to impudent Roland.
"Oh well, come Mr. Bede Greatorex--a young fellow who has been out on
the spec to Port Natal, seeing all sorts of life, is more likely, you
know, to tumble into scrapes than steady-natured young fellows who
have never been let go beyond their mothers' apron-strings."
"True," assented Bede Greatorex. "But in spite of his travelling
experiences, Roland Yorke appears to me to be one of the most
unsophisticated young men I know. In the ways of a bad world he is as
a very boy."
"He is just one of them shallow-natured, simple-minded chaps that
never _will_ be bad," pronounced Butterby, "except in the matter of
impudence. He has got enough of that to set up trading on in
Cheapside. What he'd have been, but for having got pulled up by a
unpleasant check or two, I'm not prepared to say. Well, sir, them
three being disposed of--Hurst, Jenner, and Yorke--there remained only
Mr. Brown, your manager. And it is about him I've had the honour to
solicit an interview with you."
Bede turned his eyes inquiringly from the fire to Mr. Butterby.
"You said from the first you did not suspect Mr. Brown. No more did I.
You thought it couldn't be him; he has been some years with you, and
his honesty and faithfulness had been sufficiently tested. I'm sure I
had no reasons to think otherwise, except one. Which was this: I could
not find out anything about Mr. Brown prior to some three or four
years back; his appearance on the stage of life, so to say, seemed to
date from then. However, sir, by your leave, we'll put Brown aside for
a minute, and go on to other people."
Mr. Butterby paused almost as though he expected his hearer to give
the leave in words. Bede said nothing, only waited in evident
curiosity, and the other resumed.
"There was a long-established firm in Birmingham, Johnson and Teague.
Accountants ostensibly, but did a little in bill-broking and what not;
honest men, well thought of, very respectable. Johnson (who had
succeeded his father) was a man under forty; Teague was old. Old
Teague had never married, but he had a great-nephew, in the office,
Samuel Teague; had brought him up, and loved him as the apple of his
eye. A nice young fellow in public, a wild spendthrift in private;
that's what Sam Teague was. His salary was two hundred a year, and he
lived free at his uncle's residence, outside Birmingham. His spendings
were perhaps four hundred beyond the two. Naturally he came to grief.
Do you take me, Mr. Bede Greatorex?"
"Certainly."
"In the office, one of its clerks, was a young man named George
Winter. A well-brought-up young fellow too, honest by nature, trusted,
and thought much of. He and young Teague were uncommonly intimate.
Now, how much blame was due to Winter I'm not prepared to say; but
when Samuel Teague, to save himself from some bother, forged a bill on
the office, and got it paid _by_ the office, Winter was implicated.
He'd no doubt say, if you asked him, that he was drawn into it
innocently, _did_ say it in fact; but he had been the one to hand over
the money, and the firm and the world looked upon him as the worse of
the two. When the fraud was discovered, young Teague decamped. Winter,
in self-defence and to avert consequences, went straight the same
afternoon, which was a Saturday, to old Teague's private residence,
and there made a clean breast of young Teague's long course of
misdoings. It killed old Teague."
"Killed him!" repeated Bede, for the detective made a slight pause.
"Yes, sir, killed him. He had looked upon his nephew up to that time
as one of the saints of this here middle world; and the shock of
finding him more like an angel of the lower one touched old Teague's
heart in some vital spot, and killed him. He had a sort of fit, and
died that same night. The next day, Sunday, young Winter was missing.
It was universally said that he had made his way to Liverpool, in
the track of Samuel Teague--for that's where folks thought he had
gone--with a view of getting away to America. Both were advertised
for; both looked upon as alike criminal. It was for such a paltry sum
they had perilled themselves--only a little over one hundred pounds!
Time went on, and neither of 'em was ever traced; perhaps Mr. Johnson,
when he had cooled down from his first anger, was willing to let Sam
Teague be, for the old man's sake, and so did not press the search.
Anyway Samuel Teague is now in open business in New York, and doing
well."
"And the other--Winter?"
"Ah, it's him I'm coming to," significantly resumed Mr. Butterby. "It
seems that Winter never went after him at all. In the panic of finding
old Teague had died, and that no quarter was to be expected from
Johnson (as it wasn't _then_) he took a false name, put on false hair
and whiskers, and stole quietly off by the train on Sunday afternoon,
carrying a shirt or two in a blue bag. It was to Helstonleigh he went,
Mr. Bede Greatorex, and he called himself Godfrey Pitman."
Bede Greatorex started from his seat. Up to that period he had been
perfectly calm; interested of course, but as if in something that did
not concern him.
"Yes, sir, Godfrey Pitman. The same that was in Mrs. Jones's house at
the time of Mr. Ollivera's death; the man that Helstonleigh made so
much mystery of; who was, so to say, accused of the murder. And
Godfrey Pitman, sir, or George Winter, whichever you may please to
call him, is one and the same with your managing clerk Mr. Brown!"
"No!" shouted Bede Greatorex.
"I say YES, sir. The very selfsame man."
Bede Greatorex, looking forward in a kind of wild manner, over Mr.
Butterby's head against the opposite wall, seemed to be revolving
within him various speculations connected with the disclosure.
"Why Brown has always--" He brought the words to a sudden standstill.
"Brown has always unpleasantly puzzled me," had been on the tip of his
tongue. But he let the words die away unspoken, and a sickly hue
overspread his features. Taking his eyes from the wall and turning
them on the fire, he sat as before, his brow pressed on his fingers,
quite silent, after the manner of a man who is dreaming.
"I see the disagreeable doubt that is working within you, Mr. Bede
Greatorex," remarked the observant detective, upon whom not a sign was
lost. "You are ready to say now it was Pitman did that there deed at
Helstonleigh.
"How did you find out all this about him?" asked Bede Greatorex.
"Well, I got a clue accidental. Don't mind saying so. I was about some
business lately for a gentleman in Birmingham, named Foster, and in a
packet of letters he put into my hand to look over, I found a note
from George Winter, written from your office this past summer. It was
just one of them curious chances that don't happen often; for Foster
had no notion that the letter was there, thought he had destroyed it.
It was but a line or two, and them of no moment, but it showed me that
Mr. Brown and George Winter was the same man, and I soon wormed out
his identity with Godfrey Pitman."
"Johnson and Co. will be for prosecuting him, I suppose?" observed
Bede, still as if he were dreaming.
"No," said Mr. Butterby. "I've seen Johnson and Co.: leastways
Johnson. In regard to that past transaction of theirs, his opinion has
changed, and he thinks that Winter, though culpably careless, and
unpardonably blind as to the faith he reposed in Samuel Teague, had
not himself any guilty knowledge. Anyway, Winter has been doing what
he can since to repair mischief: been living on a crust and working
night and day, to transmit sums periodically to Johnson in an
anonymous manner--except that he just let it be known they came from
him, by giving no clue to where he was, or how he gained them--with a
view to wipe off the money Sam Teague robbed them of. Teague has been
doing the same from his side the Atlantic," added Mr. Butterby with a
knowing laugh; "so that Johnson, as he says, is paid twice over.
"Then they don't prosecute?"
"Not a bit of it. And I'm free to confess that, taking in all aspects
of affairs--Brown's good conduct since, and the probability that Sam
Teague was the sole offender--the man has shown himself in all
ordinary pecuniary interests, just as honest and trustworthy as here
and there one."
"Did he----" Bede Greatorex hesitated, stopped, and then went on with
his sentence--"take my cheque?"
"That must be left to your judgment, sir. I've no cause myself to make
sure of it. The letter to Foster was written about the time the cheque
was lost, or a few days later; it made an allusion to money, Brown
saying he was glad to be out of his debt, but whether the debt was
pounds or shillings, I've no present means of knowing. Foster wouldn't
answer me a syllable; was uncommonly savage at his own carelessness in
letting the letter get amid the other. Living close and working hard,
Brown would have money in hand of his own without touching yours, Mr.
Bede Greatorex."
Bede nodded.
"On the other hand, a man who has lain under a cloud is more to be
doubted than one who has walked about in the open sunshine all his
life. The presenter of that cheque at the bank had a quantity of black
hair about his face, just as the false Godfrey Pitman had on his at
Helstonleigh. But it would be hardly fair to suspect Brown on that
score, seeing there's so many faces in London adorned with it
natural."
Again Bede nodded in acquiescence.
"Of course, sir, if you choose to put it to the test, you might have
Mr. Brown's face dressed up for it, and let the bank see him. Anyway,
'twould set the matter at rest."
"No," said Bede, quite sharply. "No, I should not like to do it. I
never thought of Brown in the affair; never. I--can't--don't--think of
him now."
Did he not now think of him? Butterby, with his keen ears, fancied the
last concluding sentence had a false ring in it.
"Well, sir, that lies at your own option. I've done my duty in making
you acquainted with this, but I've no call to stir in it, unless you
choose to put it officially into my hands. But there's the other and
graver matter, Mr. Bede Greatorex."
"What other?" questioned Bede, turning to him.
"That at Helstonleigh," said the detective. "All sorts of notions and
thoughts--fanciful some of 'em--come crowding through my mind at once.
I don't say that he had any hand in Mr. Ollivera's death; but it might
have been so: and this, that has now come out, strengthens the
suspicion against him in some points, and weakens it in others. You
remember the queer conduct of Alletha Rye at the time, sir--her dream,
and her show-off at the grave--which I had the satisfaction of looking
on at myself--and her emotion altogether?"
Bede Greatorex replied that he did remember it: also remembered that
he was unable to understand why it should have been so. But he spoke
like one whose mind is far away, as if the questions bore little
interest.
"George Winter and Alletha Rye were sweethearts: she used to live in
Birmingham before she came to Helstonleigh. But for his getting into
trouble, they'd soon have been married."
"Oh, sweethearts were they," carelessly observed Bede. "She is a
superior young woman."
"Granted, sir. But them superior women are not a bit wiser nor better
than others when their lovers is in question. Women have done mad
things for men's sakes afore today; and it strikes me now, that
Alletha Rye was just screening him, fearing he might have done it. I
don't see how else her madness and mooning is to be accounted for. On
the other hand, it seems uncommon droll that George Winter, hiding in
that top room until he could get safely away, should set himself out
to harm Mr. Ollivera; a man he'd never seen. Which was the view I took
at the time."
"And highly improbable," murmured Bede.
"Well, so I say; and I can't help thinking he'll come out of the fiery
ordeal unscorched."
"What ordeal?"
"The charge of murder. Mr. Greatorex is safe to give him into custody
upon it. I don't know that the Grand Jury would find a true bill."
All in a moment, Bede's face took a ghastly look of fear. It startled
even the detective, as it was turned sharply upon him. And the voice
in which he spoke was harsh and commanding.
"This must not be suffered to come to the knowledge of my father."
"Not suffered to come to his knowledge!" echoed Butterby, agape with
wonder.
"No, NO! You must not let him know that Brown is Godfrey Pitman. He
must never be told that Pitman is found."
"Why, Heaven bless you, Mr. Bede Greatorex! my honour has been engaged
all along in the tracing out of Pitman. That one man has given me more
in'ard trouble than any three. We detectives get hold of mortifying
things as well as other people, and that's been one of mine. Now that
I have trapped Pitman, I can't let the matter drop: and I'm sure Mr.
Greatorex won't."
Bede looked confounded. He opened his month to speak, and closed it
again.
"And if us two was foolish enough, there's another that wouldn't; that
would a'most make us answer for it with our lives," resumed the
detective, in a low, impressive tone--"and that is Parson Ollivera."
"I tell you, Butterby, this must be hushed up," repeated Bede, his
agitation unmistakable, his voice strangely hollow. "It must be hushed
up at any cost. _Do nothing_."
"And if the parson finds Pitman out for himself?" asked Butterby, his
deep green eyes, shaded by their overhanging eyebrows, looking out
steadily at Bede.
"That is a contingency we have nothing to do with yet. Time enough to
talk of it when it comes."
"But, Mr. Bede Greatorex, if Pitman really was the----"
"Hush! Stay!" interrupted Bede, glancing round involuntarily, as if
afraid of the very walls. "For Heaven's sake, Butterby, let the whole
thing drop; now and for ever. There are interests involved in it that
I cannot speak of--that must at all risks be kept from my father. I
wish I could unburthen myself of the whole complication, and lay the
matter bare before you; but I may not bring trouble on other people.
To accuse Pitman would--would re-open wounds partially healed; it
might bring worse than death amidst us."
It truly seemed, bending over the table in his imperative, realistic
earnestness, that Bede was longing to pour out the confidence he dared
not give. Butterby, revolving sundry speculations in his mind, never
took his eyes for an instant from the eager face.
"Answer me one question, Mr. Bede Greatorex--an' you don't mind doing
it. If you knew that Pitman was the slayer of your cousin, would you
still screen him?"
"If I knew--if I thought that Pitman had done that evil deed, I would
be the first to hand him over to justice," spoke Bede, breathing
quickly. "I feel sure he did not."
Butterby paused. "Sir, as you have said so much, I think you should
say a little more. It will be safe. You've got, I see, some other
suspicion."
"I have always believed that it was _one_ person did that," said Bede,
scarcely able to speak for agitation. "If--understand me--if it was
not an accident, or as the jury brought in, why then I think I suspect
who and what it really was. Not Pitman."
"Can the person be got at?" inquired Butterby.
"Not for any practical use; not for accusation."
"Is it any one of them I've heard mentioned in connection with the
death?"
"No; neither you nor the world. Let that pass. On my word of honour, I
say to you, Mr. Butterby, that I feel sure Pitman had no hand in the
matter for that reason, and for other involved reasons, I wish this
information you have given me to remain buried; a secret between you
and me. I will take my own time and opportunity for discharging Mr.
Brown. Will you promise this? Should you have incurred costs in
anyway, I will give you my cheque for the amount."
"There has not been much cost as yet," returned the detective,
honestly. "We'll let that be for now. What you ask me is difficult,
sir. I might get into trouble for it later at headquarters."
"Should that turn out to be the case, you can, in self-defence, bring
forward my injunctions. Say I stopped proceedings."
"Very well," returned Butterby, after a pause of consideration. "Then
for the present, sir, we'll say it shall stand so. Of course, if the
thing is brought to light through other folks, I must be held absolved
from my promise."
"Thank you; thank you truly, Mr. Butterby."
Bede Greatorex, the naturally haughty-natured man, condescended to
shake hands with the detective. Mr. Butterby attended him downstairs,
and opened the door for him. It was after he had gained Fleet Street,
that Bede came in contact with the shoulders of Roland Yorke, never
noticing him, bearing on in his all-powerful abstraction, his face
worn, anxious, white, scared, like that of a man, as Roland took
occasion to remark, who has met a ghost.
Back up the stairs turned Mr. Butterby, and sat down in front of the
fire, leaving the gas-burners to light up his back.
There, with a hand on either knee, he recalled all the circumstances
of John Ollivera's death with mental accuracy, and went over them one
by one. That done, he revolved surrounding interests in his silent
way, especially the words that had just fallen from Bede Greatorex one
single sentence, during the whole reverie, escaping his lips.
"Was Louisa Joliffe out that evening, I wonder?"
And the clock of St. Clement Danes had moved on an hour and a quarter
before he ever lifted his hands or rose from his seat.