Nickie shook his head. "I don't run for the police?" he said. "No, I am not on speaking terms with the police myself."

"You won't seize me, you won't betray me--you, a clergyman!"

"No." said Nicholas Crips.

The woman moved forward, she laid hands upon him, she looked into his face.

"He was a villain." she said. "He deserved it, but I am a murderess, and you won't--" Her hands gripped him, a new light shone in her eyes.

"Why were you creeping in here?" she said. "You are a thief, That's it--you are a thief. Well, listen, there are five thousand pounds' worth of diamonds in a little leather bag in his breast pocket!" She pointed down at the body. "Five thousand pounds' worth," she said.

"Five thousand!" he gasped. "Five thousand!"

The woman's hand was on the door k.n.o.b. She opened the door and slipped out. The lock clicked as she closed the door behind her.

CHAPTER VI.

A DEPARTURE INTO ART.

NICHOLAS CRIPS seated-himself on a warm stone, on a convenient boulder spread the contents of yesterday's "Age." The "Age" contents on this occasion was the lunch of Mr. Nicholas Grips. Nickie had been given the meal half-an-hour earlier by a kind soul in one of the suburbs, to whom he had pitifully presented his urgent need of sustenance of an inviting kind. Very adroitly Nickie the Kid had dwelt upon his necessities, while impressing the lady's with the eccentricities of a peculiarly capricious appet.i.te.

It was the day after the distressing incident in Biggs's Buildings. Mr.

Crips was no longer dressed in his clerical garments; they were carefully stowed away in a niche in a riverside quarry where he had long kept his wardrobe. To-day Nickie was dressed in the rags of a simple mendicant.

The strongly melodramatic adventure the previous day did not seem to distress Mr. Crips; he ate heartily, but had only reached his second course, which was represented by the chicken, when his attention was attracted by a very lean, very pale, hollow-eyed, sad stranger who had seated himself on a sloping tree nearer the river, and was eyeing the banquet hungrily.

Nickie the Kid, was not selfish. When his own needs were fairly met he could be generous with anybody's property, even his own. He tapped the chicken's breastbone invitingly with his penknife, and addressed the stranger.

"May I offer you a little lunch, sir?" he said urbanely, with quite the air of a generous host.

The long, lean man shook his head in mute melancholy, but accepted the invitation as an offer of friendship, and approached nearer, seating himself on a rock facing Nickie's banquet.

"No, thanks, boss," he said.

"You'll forgive me," said Nickie, after wrenching a mouthful from the back of the pullet, "but you look famished."

"I am," answered the stranger.

"Well, help yourself. These garlic sausage sandwiches are superb. Try the beer."

Nickie pushed his jam tin forward.

The other shook his head very regretfully.

"I mustn't," he said. "Fact is, my livin' depends on me not eatin', an'

I've got a wife an' kiddies to support."

Nickie paused with the bottle half-way to his mouth.

"Your living depends on your not eating?" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "What, do you earn anything by starving, then? By Jove, that's a quaint idea."

"I earn all I get by starvin'. My name's Cann--Matty Cann, but I'm known professionally as Bony-part. Ain't yeh seen me advertis.e.m.e.nts up the main street? I'm drawed on a big poster outside Professer Thunder's Museum iv Marvels, I'm the livin' skelington."

"He isn't ruining himself with your upkeep," Nickie.

"No." replied the Living Skeleton. "I'm allowanced off an' I've got t'

eat on'y what he gives me--that's in our contrac'. If I eat more an put on flesh out I go. There's a clause in ther contrac' what sez I'm li'ble t' be fired if goes above seven stone seven. The previous livin'

skelington got the run at Barnip fer breakin' out. He was the only original. I'm just a sort iv understudy."

Nickie clicked his tongue sympathetically. "Well," he said, "you might pick a bone. That wouldn't be very fattening, and it might delude your stomach with the idea you were having something to eat."

Bonypart, the Living Skeleton, took the wish-bone with a few shreds of chicken on it.

"Thanks," he said, "it might be a comfort." He sucked the bone fondly.

"You said that Professor Thunder's only original living skeelton broke out at Barnip. What happened to him?"

"He went on the spree," said Matty Cann.

"Drink?" queried Nickie.

"No, food. He got at a bar spread in the Shire hall at Barnip, an' afore they missed him he ate enough fer ten Shire Councillors. He completely rooned that banquet. That was the third time he'd gone on th' spree, an'

ther Perfesser 'ad warned him if it 'appened again he'd get the shoot."

Nickie the Kid grinned.

"It isn't a Profession that would suit me," he said. "I have an instinctive fondness for meals. I knew the travelling show' business was a hungry game but I never reckoned on starvation as a means of earning a livelihood."

"Oh. 'tisn't all bad," said Bonypart eagerly. "There's th' Missin' Link, fer instance; he a glutton. Blime, th' food that Missin' Link gets makes me lose all patience, an' sometimes I'd like t' get right up from my chair, an' bite him. He's in the 'ospital just now, sufferin' from his over--feedin'. It's a judgment on him."

"A monkey in the hospital!"

"Well, he ain't exactly a monkey. He was a man done up something like one o' them hoorang-hoo-tangs. Yeh see, part o' Perfesser Thunder's show is called the Descent of Man. It contains ten different kinds of monkeys, from Spider, a little cove 'bout th' size iv a rat, up t' Ammonia, what's a big griller. Th' Missin' Link, he comes next; but as I was sayin' he's out iv it just now, bein' ill, an' Perfesser Thunder ud give ez much ez two quid er week fee a good, reliable Missin' Link what wouldn't over-eat hisself." The Living Skeleton was allowing an inquiring eye to roam over Nickie the Kid.

"I was thinkin' yon was just bout th' build fer a Missin' Link," he said.

"What, me?" cried Nickie.

The Skeleton nodded, and Nickie was silent for a moment, lost in thought.

It was very necessary that Nickie should sink his ident.i.ty for a time.

Here was a magnificent opportunity. "Has the Missing Link much to do?" he asked.

"No," replied Matty Cann. "He's just gotter he careful not t' over-eat hisseif, as I was savin'. Yeh see, people what come in t' th' show gives him buns, an' lollies an' things, an' if he's a glutton he' bound t' be knocked out."

"What else does he do?"