is on my explicit orders.”
And so I took my leave and made straight for our hackney. I hurried the two girls out of the coach and bade them follow me. Just as our little group was starting for the house, the driver called down from his seat.
“Say, lad, I see guns and suchlike carried by some. Will there be shooting?”
“Oh no sir,” said I. “Not a chance of it, I’m sure.” A lie, of course.
“Well, that’s good, ’cause if I hear any shots, I shall be out of here quicker than it takes to tell. Tell the blind gentleman that, will you?”
I promised I would, then hurried Elizabeth and Clarissa to the front door. But alas, before reaching it, we were intercepted by Mr. Turbott, who left the group with whom he had been arguing but a moment before.
“Where are you taking her?” he demanded.
“Taking who?”
“As if you didn’t know who I meant! Taking Elizabeth, of course.”
“Sir John requested her presence,” said I. “He wishes to put accuser and accused together that they may thrash things out-so he said.”
“Oh? He did, did he? Well, there’s no need for that. Once we get inside, we’ll have them all pleading with us to listen to their stories. We’ll get the truth out of them!”
“Sir John asked me to tell you that you and you alone may enter-and none of the rest. Any who try to follow you inside will be arrested. I may add, sir, that if you make so bold as to urge and abet any else to enter, then you, too, will be arrested.”
“On what charge?”
“Oh, home invasion would do. And one thing more. You must leave your sword outside. Do you accept the terms?”
To which he replied with a sigh so deep it might well have been a growl. And then: “Yes.”
When I turned back to the two girls after the brief negotiation, I found Clarissa all a-giggle and Elizabeth appearing most concerned.
We were admitted by one scarce older than myself, pretty enough and plump. She curtsied near as well as Elizabeth herself, then led us down a hall to the kitchen. On the way, Clarissa whispered into my ear.
“I thought you quite wonderful with that man, Turbott,” said she. “Wouldn’t give an inch, would you?”
It was not the sort of question that called for a response-a statement, rather. Yet as I glanced at her at that moment, I saw something in her eyes that I had never before seen: Clarissa seemed truly admiring of me. It was as if in the past few minutes I had grown near a foot in her estimation. I had never been given such a look before. It was the sort that one had to live up to.
Just then we did hear something that must have disturbed Turbott and Elizabeth. From the kitchen came the sound of laughter-Sir John’s booming baritone and, mingled with it, a light soprano; the latter was surely that of Mother Jeffers. Yet, if we heard them, they also heard us, and the laughter halted soon as ever it had begun.
Ugly though she may have been, Mother Jeffers proved an adequate hostess. She had only to nod at the pot of tea and the cups surrounding it, and the girl who had opened the door to us set about serving up the promised tea. In another minute or two, there was tea and buttered bread before us all.
“Now,” said Sir John, “we meet here that accuser and accused might have the opportunity to confront each other direct, to defend themselves, if need be, to make the other prove her innocence.”
He stopped at that point to clear his throat. It was in the nature of punctuation. He wanted it made clear that, beyond this point, he was speaking ex officio. He began:
“Elizabeth Hooker, here on my left, has given it to me that on the evening of Easter Sunday, two young men, promising to see her home, set off instead for this place, where they might show her to you, Mrs. Jeffers, and get for their trouble some amount of money from you.”
“What were their names?” asked Mother Jeffers.
“Dick and Bobby,” said Elizabeth.
“I must think upon that,” said the old woman, “but just now I can think of nine or more I know by those names. You have only the first names?”
“I am near certain that is the case,” said Sir John, “but let us move on, shall we? You were, as she has given it, sitting in this very kitchen when the two brought her to you.” Then did Sir John turn to Elizabeth and ask her most direct, “Is this the woman who spoke to you and asked if you were willing to join her company?”
“Is this the woman? Yes, indeed it is. This is the one who asked me, would I join them.”
“Are you sure?”
“How could I forget a face such as hers?”
“If you will pardon me,” said Sir John, “it seems to me that what you just said was unnecessarily rude.”
“So be it,” said Elizabeth.
“And you, Mrs. Jeffers, what defense have you against this accusation?”
“I have none,” said she almost proudly.
“None?”
“I have never seen this girl before in my life,” said she.
There matters seemed to hang. It was not so much the denial as the manner in which it was given that put things at a halt. It was so coldly complete that I, for one, felt that there was nothing more to say. Yet impeded though he was, Sir John pressed on.
“May I, then,” said he, “take Mistress Hooker through your house and visit such of it as she remembers? Note that I ask your permission in this, for you would be within your rights to demand that you see a search warrant before allowing us the run of your house.”
“I understand,” said she. “But yes, you have my permission to go anywhere within this house.” And then, emphasizing each word, she said: “
“Thank you.”
“My daughter will show you round.”
And with that, the girl who had spied us from the floor above showed us the way, and we followed her on a room-by-room tour of the entire house. That she was the daughter of Mother Jeffers surprised me-and I’m sure others, as well-but that was not the only surprise that awaited us.
We had visited every room but one and routed two women out of their beds. Elizabeth would search all for her stolen frock; we then started up the narrow stairway to the garret room. There it was that Elizabeth had spent all the time of her imprisonment. She had described it well enough so that I had a fair idea of its look. Once inside, however, we found this garret room was altogether different from the one she had described. Where she had told of sleeping on a pile of straw with naught but a thin blanket to keep her warm, what we saw was a comfortable- looking bed with a comforter that would, it seemed, have kept anyone warm. There was a chair and a table, curtained windows that were held by latches alone. And, in one corner, a wardrobe.
“They’ve changed it all,” said Elizabeth. “They’ve changed it completely!”
“Nothing has been altered,” said Mrs. Jeffers’s daughter. “And I should know, for this is my room here.”
Elizabeth gave her a killing look, then hastened to the wardrobe.
“This proves she lies, and I alone tell the truth,” said she, “for here-look! This is mine! This is the frock taken from me when I arrived at this place.”
She held it up proudly, but it was obvious to me, as it was also to Clarissa, that the frock had been made for one much more corpulent than Elizabeth-indeed, it had been made for Jeffers’s daughter.
“I shall not fight you for it,” said she, “for my mother would not have that. But it should be plain to all who see you with it now that it was not made for you.”
The matter of the dress, as well as much else, was held in abeyance-undecided till we reached Bow Street. Sir John took with us Mother Jeffers and gave Elizabeth in exchange. (“Well rid of her!” said Clarissa, who had soured completely on her old friend.) I confess, reader, that I slept through our entire return journey, rocking back and forth, bouncing up and down, just as Elizabeth had done on the voyage out. According to Clarissa, Jeffers was quite entertaining, though she declared it pained her to leave her daughter in the house. Sir John did not say that he was officially detaining her; he said simply that he had further questions for her to answer in his office in Bow Street. He wished to ask them after he had held his court session. Again, all this was reported to me later by
