When I came to I found myself seated in the superintendent's room, with
a policeman standing quietly in the background.
As soon as I had fully recovered consciousness, the superintendent
motioned the policeman out of the room for a while, and then gently
forced me to swallow a brandy and soda.
"Mr. Tait," he said compassionately, after an awkward pause, "you are a
very young man indeed, and, I believe, hitherto of blameless character.
Now, I should be very sorry to have to proceed to extremities against
you. I know to what lengths, in a moment of weakness, the desire to
possess a rare coin will often lead a connoisseur, under stress of
exceptional temptation. I have not the slightest doubt in my own mind
that you did really accidentally drop this coin; that you went down on
your knees honestly intending to find it; that the accident suggested to
you the ease with which you might pick it up and proceed to pocket it;
that you yielded temporarily to that unfortunate impulse; and that by
the time I arrived upon the scene you were already overcome with remorse
and horror. I saw as much immediately in your very countenance.
Nevertheless, I determined to give you the benefit of the doubt, and I
searched over the whole place in the most thorough and conscientious
manner.... As you know, I found nothing.... Mr. Tait, I cannot bear to
have to deal harshly with you. I recognize the temptation and the agony
of repentance that instantly followed it. Sir, I give you one chance. If
you will retract the obviously false story that you just now told me,
and confess that the coin I found in your pocket was in fact, as I know
it to be, the Museum specimen, I will forthwith dismiss the constable,
and will never say another word to any one about the whole matter. I
don't want to ruin you, but I can't, of course, be put off with a
falsehood. Think the matter carefully over with yourself. Do you or do
you not still adhere to that very improbable and incredible story?"
Horrified and terror-stricken as I was, I couldn't avoid feeling
grateful to the superintendent for the evident kindness with which he
was treating me. The tears rose at once into my eyes.
"Mr. Harbourne," I cried passionately, "you are very good, very
generous. But you quite mistake the whole position. The story I told you
was true, every word of it. I bought that gold Wulfric from a ploughman
at Lichfield, and it is not absolutely identical with the Museum
specimen which I dropped upon the floor. It is closer clipped round the
edges, and it has a distinct dent upon the obverse side, just below the
W of Wulfric."
The superintendent paused a second, and scanned my face very closely.
"Have you a knife or a file in your pocket?" he asked in a much sterner
and more official tone.
"No," I replied, "neither--neither."
"You are sure?"
"Certain."
"Shall I search you myself, or shall I give you in custody?"
"Search me yourself," I answered confidently.
He put his hand quietly into my left-hand breast pocket, and to my utter
horror and dismay drew forth, what I had up to that moment utterly
forgotten, a pair of folding pocket nail-scissors, in a leather case, of
course with a little file on either side.
My heart stood still within me.
"That is quite sufficient, Mr. Tait," the superintendent went on,
severely. "Had you alleged that the Museum coin was smaller than your
own imaginary one you might have been able to put in the facts as good
evidence. But I see the exact contrary is the case. You have stooped to
a disgraceful and unworthy subterfuge. This base deception aggravates
your guilt. You have deliberately defaced a valuable specimen in order
if possible to destroy its identity."
What could I say in return? I stammered and hesitated.
"Mr. Harbourne," I cried piteously, "the circumstances seem to look
terribly against me. But, nevertheless, you are quite mistaken. Tho
missing Wulfric will come to light sooner or later and prove me
innocent."
He walked up and down the room once or twice irresolutely, and then he
turned round to me with a very fixed and determined aspect which fairly
terrified me.
"Mr. Tait," he said, "I am straining every point possible to save you,
but you make it very difficult for me by your continued falsehood. I am
doing quite wrong in being so lenient to you; I am proposing, in short,
to compound a felony. But I cannot bear, without letting you have just
one more chance, to give you in charge for a common robbery. I will let
you have ten minutes to consider the matter; and I beseech you, I beg of
you, I implore you to retract this absurd and despicable lie before it
is too late for ever. Just consider that if you refuse I shall have to
hand you over to the constable out there, and that the whole truth must
come out in court, and must be blazoned forth to the entire world in
every newspaper. The policeman is standing here by the door. I will
leave you alone with your own thoughts for ten minutes."
As he spoke he walked out gravely, and shut the door solemnly behind
him. The clock on the chimney-piece pointed with its hands to twenty
minutes past three.
It was an awful dilemma. I hardly knew how to act under it. On the one
hand, if I admitted for the moment that I had tried to steal the coin, I
could avoid all immediate unpleasant circumstances; and as it would be
sure to turn up again in cleaning the Museum, I should be able at last
to prove my innocence to Mr. Harbourne's complete satisfaction. But, on
the other hand, the lie--for it _was_ a lie--stuck in my throat; I could
not humble myself to say I had committed a mean and dirty action which I
loathed with all the force and energy of my nature. No, no! come what
would of it, I must stick by the truth, and trust to that to clear up
everything.
But if the superintendent really insisted on giving me in charge, how
very awkward to have to telegraph about it to Emily! Fancy saying to the
girl you are in love with, "I can't go with you to the theatre this
evening, because I have been taken off to gaol on a charge of stealing a
valuable coin from the British Museum." It was too terrible!
Yet, after all, I thought to myself, if the worst comes to the worst,
Emily will have faith enough in me to know it is ridiculous; and,
indeed, the imputation could in any case only be temporary. As soon as
the thing gets into court I could bring up the Lichfield ploughman to
prove my possession of a gold Wulfric; and I could bring up Emily to
prove that I had shown it to her that very morning. How lucky that I had
happened to take it out and let her look at it! My case was, happily, as
plain as a pikestaff. It was only momentarily that the weight of the
evidence seemed so perversely to go against me.
Turning over all these various considerations in my mind with anxious
hesitancy, the ten minutes managed to pass away almost before I had
thoroughly realized the deep gravity of the situation.
As the clock on the chimney-piece pointed to the half-hour, the door
opened once more, and the superintendent entered solemnly. "Well, Mr.
Tait," he said in an anxious voice, "have you made up your mind to make
a clean breast of it? Do you now admit, after full deliberation, that
you have endeavoured to steal and clip the gold Wulfric?"
"No," I answered firmly, "I do not admit it; and I will willingly go
before a jury of my countrymen to prove my innocence."
"Then God help you, poor boy," the superintendent cried despondently. "I
have done my best to save you, and you will not let me. Policeman, this
is your prisoner. I give him in custody on a charge of stealing a gold
coin, the property of the trustees of this Museum, valued at a hundred
and seventy-five pounds sterling."
The policeman laid his hand upon my wrist. "You will have to go along
with me to the station, sir," he said quietly.
Terrified and stunned as I was by the awfulness of the accusation, I
could not forget or overlook the superintendent's evident reluctance and
kindness. "Mr. Harbourne," I cried, "you have tried to do your best for
me. I am grateful to you for it, in spite of your terrible mistake, and
I shall yet be able to show you that I am innocent."
He shook his head gloomily. "I have done my duty," he said with a
shudder. "I have never before had a more painful one. Policeman, I must
ask you now to do yours."