He turned his head sharply, and looked at me. I regarded him steadily.

"That's a matter you'll have to explain," he said, with a grin.

"I?" It was my turn to look amazed.

"Yes--you," he said. "I've got my story ready when the time comes, I a.s.sure you. All I've had to do with it has been the covering up of your traces; that was only pity for a forlorn wretch, hunted almost to death.

The changing of the clothes was your business. I don't see how it affects me."

We had come to a point where he was turning off in one direction and I going in another. I gave him my final shot at parting. "Not if Gregory Pennington really committed suicide," I said.

I looked back when I had gone a little way, and saw Bardolph Just in the same att.i.tude in which I had left him, looking after me. It was as though I had stricken him dumb and motionless with what I had said, and I was now more than ever convinced that Debora had been right in her conjecture. I had done one good thing, at least; he would scarcely dare to carry out his threat of exposing me; he might think that I had some inside knowledge of which he was ignorant.

Meanwhile I was seriously troubled about Debora. It was impossible for me to know what had become of her, or where she was; my only hope was that there might be an accidental meeting between us. The various places known to us both were known also to our enemies; if Debora had gone to the house of Uncle Zabdiel she would in all probability have been seen there by Bardolph Just, or by some one in his pay. Similarly, she would, of course, keep as far away as possible from his house and from the cottage where once I had left her with Harvey Scoffold. I roamed the streets, looking into every face that pa.s.sed me, yet never seeing the face for which I longed.

An inquest on Uncle Zabdiel took place in the ordinary course, and a certain John New gave evidence of his slight acquaintance with the murdered gentleman, and of what he had seen on the night of the murder.

The astounding fact that Andrew Ferkoe had slept through the whole business came out in court, and was the immediate cause of some extraordinary newspaper headlines, in which more than one reporter developed a hitherto undiscovered talent for wit at Andrew's expense. It may be wondered at, perhaps, that I should have persuaded the boy to stick to his original story, but, apart from anything else, I had strong reasons for preventing any suspicion falling upon the man Capper, and, above all, I did not for a moment believe that Andrew Ferkoe's real story would be believed. I had grown to believe it myself, but I thought that for many reasons it might be well if Ferkoe left it to be imagined that he had really slept, and had seen nothing.

So the matter remained a mystery, with only one curious element in it, for me at least, and that was a little point that came out in the evidence. It seemed that no finger prints had been discovered anywhere, although many things in the house had been handled. It was obvious that the murderer had worn gloves. That seemed to point to a more professional hand than that of poor Capper, and served a little to upset my theory, but on the whole I believed it still.

I was to be undeceived, nevertheless, and that within a little time. On the very day of the inquest, when Andrew Ferkoe and myself were walking away, we turned, with almost a natural impulse, towards the house which had been the scene of the tragedy--perhaps you may call that a morbid impulse. It was a place that would always have a curious attraction for me, by reason of the fact that the greater part of my life had been spent there, and that I had seen many curious things occur there, and that once poor Debora had taken refuge in it. It was all ended now with the death of the man who had worked so much harm to me; I was thinking about it all as I stood outside the place, when I felt my arm clutched convulsively, and looked round, to see that Andrew Ferkoe, with a dropping jaw, was staring at a man who was standing at a little distance from us, also watching the house--a man dressed as a labourer.

"What's the matter?" I whispered. I could not see the man's face from where I stood; his cap was drawn down at one side, so as partially to conceal it.

"That's the man!" whispered Andrew, in a shaking voice. "I know the clothes, and I saw his face for a moment when he turned this way."

"Pull yourself together, and don't look as if you'd seen a ghost," I whispered sharply. "We'll follow the man, and see where he goes. As he hasn't seen you, go on ahead a bit, and then turn so that you can see his face; then come back to me."

The youth hurried away; walked past the man with his long stride; then came back. I saw the man glance at him for a moment sharply as he came past; then Andrew came up to me, his face white with excitement.

"That's the man! I'm certain of it," he said.

We walked for a long way after the man, until at last he seemed to have some suspicion concerning us. Once or twice he stopped, and, of course, we stopped also; then at last he turned about, and came straight back towards where we waited.

He carried his head low, but I thought I knew the bend of his shoulders; I was convinced that in a moment he would look up, and I should see William Capper looking at me.

But I was wrong. For when he looked up, with a sullen glance of defiance, I saw that it was George Rabbit!

CHAPTER XIV.

WILLIAM CAPPER COMES TO LIFE.

Mr. George Rabbit looked me up and down with a new expression of countenance. I noticed, too, that some of his alertness was gone, and that his narrow, shifty eyes avoided mine. He had no reason to think that I should suspect him of the murder of my Uncle Zabdiel; nevertheless, he looked at me resentfully, as though, before even I had spoken, he knew I was going to accuse him of it.

"Wotjer mean by follerin' a honest man about like this 'ere?" he demanded savagely. "If I 'ad my rights, I ought to be follerin' you, Mr.

Jail-bird--seein' wot I know abaht yer." Then, as I said nothing, but looked at him steadily, he broke out more fiercely: "W'y don't yer speak? Wot 'ave yer got against me, eh?"

I took him by the arm, and suddenly wrenched his hand round, so that I could look at the palm of it; then I bent forward, and whispered to him swiftly: "There's blood on your hands!"

He struggled faintly for a moment to get free; his face had gone to a sickly green colour. "You're mad--stark, starin', ravin' mad!" he exclaimed. "Don't you say sich things against me, or I'll blab--sure as death!"

"Death's the word," I retorted. "Now, George Rabbit, we've got to talk over this thing, and we may as well do it quietly. Take me to some place where I can say what I have to say."

He hesitated for a moment, undecided whether to treat the matter with defiance, or to accede to my demands; at last he shrugged his shoulders, spat emphatically on the ground, and turned to lead the way. He turned back again a moment later, and looked at Andrew Ferkoe with a new resentment.

"Wot's this chap got to do wiv it?" he asked. "'Ave you bin blabbin' to 'im abaht it?"

"There was no necessity to do that," I replied quietly. "He saw you do it. Now, don't stand talking here; it might be dangerous."

He stood in an amazed silence for a moment, and then turned and walked away. We followed him rapidly, noticing that every now and then he turned to look back over his shoulder, as if undecided whether, after all, he would not turn back altogether, and refuse to go further. But he went on, nevertheless, and at last brought us to a little public house in a side street. Thrusting open a door with his shoulder, he went in, leaving us to follow; and we presently found ourselves in a little room with a sanded floor--a species of bar parlour. There the three of us sat down round a little beer-stained table, and after I had ordered refreshments (with a double quant.i.ty for George Rabbit, because he took the first at a gulp), I began to say what was in my mind.

"When I saw you first to-day you were looking at a house where an old man was murdered a few days back," I began.

"Wot of it?" he demanded. "A lot of people 'ave bin lookin' at that 'ouse; they always does w'en anythink like that's 'appened."

"You were obliged to go back to it--the man who commits a murder always must, you know. You wanted to see if any one had suspected you."

The man glanced nervously round the room, and then thrust his face towards mine across the table. "Wot's this 'ere talk abaht a murder?" he whispered. "Wot's this 'ere talk abaht this chap 'aving seen me do it?

Wot's this business abaht takin' away a honest man's character?"

"When you broke into the house the other night, and came face to face with Zabdiel Blowfield, and got the stick out of his hand and killed him, someone was watching you," I answered steadily.

"Watchin' me! W'y, the ole chap lived alone!" he exclaimed incautiously.

Then, seeing the smile on my face, he went on hurriedly, "Leastways, so I've bin told, on'y I don't know nothink abaht it."

"You were sent there first by Martha Leach. My uncle wanted to see you, because he thought your evidence might be useful in getting me back to my prison," I went on remorselessly. "That gave you the idea of robbing the old man; you didn't stick at murder when you were pushed to it. This lad here"--I indicated Andrew Ferkoe as I spoke--"was asleep in the house at the time, as you would have heard, if you had been at the inquest. He got out of bed and saw you. How else do you suppose he was able to point you out to-day as the man he saw in the house?"

George Rabbit looked from one to the other of us narrowly; then he began to speak almost as if to himself. "Now I comes to think of it, I did 'ear a noise up above in the 'ouse. So it was you, was it?" he said, turning wrathfully on Andrew Ferkoe. "My G.o.d! it's a lucky thing for you I didn't find you; I'd 'ave put your light out!"

"I know that," answered Andrew quietly. "That was why I didn't make a noise."

"Well, an' wot's the little game now?" asked Rabbit impudently, as he leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. "Mr. Jail-bird, let's 'ear wot you've got to say. You can't bring a charge like this against a honest man without some proof. I 'ave 'eard that no finger prints 'ave bin discovered, so that you won't git much that way."

"I can find a dozen ways of running you to earth," I replied. "On the other hand, it may not pay me to do so."

"Yus, that's the trouble, ain't it?" he said with a sneer. "They might ask you awkward questions, or I might 'ave a word to say abaht the gent wot's takin' my character away. Then again, wot's 'is nibs 'ere bin sayin' at the inquest?"

I was bound to confess that Andrew had stated that he had slept soundly on the night of the murder, and had heard nothing and seen nothing.

George Rabbit, growing more confident with every moment, grinned and kissed his grimy finger-tips in the direction of Andrew.

"An' now 'e'll 'ave to tell anuvver tale!" he exclaimed. "If it comes to that, 'oo's to say 'e didn't do the job 'imself; 'e was in the 'ouse."

It was not my purpose to bring the man to justice; it would go hard with me, as well, perhaps, with Andrew Ferkoe, if I made any attempt to slip a noose about the fellow's neck. Yet, much as I loathed the man, I realised that the killing of my Uncle Zabdiel had not been any premeditated affair; it had been a blow struck, brutally enough, for his own liberty by this man who now sat before me. My purpose was to use him, if possible, as an instrument for myself, to trade upon my knowledge of what he had done, and so bind him first to silence about myself and who I was, and next to a.s.sist me in the finding of Debora and the destruction of Bardolph Just's plans. I set about that now without more ado.

"As I have said, it would be easy enough to prove the matter," I answered, "and I should have the satisfaction of seeing you hang; but that's not my plan. We are the only people who know the truth, and we shall not speak."

I saw Andrew Ferkoe glance at me swiftly for a moment; as for Rabbit, he sat gaping at me as though he had not heard aright. "You mean it?" he gasped.