“I suppose, then, we’d better be alone,” said Patience; whereupon the woman of the house discreetly left the room.
The interview was so long that the reader would be fatigued were he asked to study a record of all that was said on the occasion. The gentleman and lady were closeted together for more than an hour, and so amicably was the conversation carried on that when the time was half over Gager stepped downstairs and interested himself in procuring Miss Crabstick’s breakfast. He even condescended himself to pick a few shrimps and drink a glass of beer in her company. A great deal was said, and something was even settled, as may be learned from a few concluding words of that very memorable conversation. “Just don’t you say anything about it, my dear, but leave word for him that you’ve gone up to town on business.”
“Lord love you, Mr. Gager, he’ll know all about it.”
“Let him know. Of course he’ll know—if he comes down. It’s my belief he’ll never show himself at Ramsgate again.”
“But, Mr. Gager—”
“Well, my dear?”
“You aren’t a perjuring of yourself?”
“What;—about making you my wife? That I ain’t. I’m upright, and always was. There’s no mistake about me when you’ve got my word. As soon as this work is off my mind, you shall be Mrs. Gager, my dear. And you’ll be all right. You’ve been took in, that’s what you have.”
“That I have, Mr. Gager,” said Patience, wiping her eyes.
“You’ve been took in, and you must be forgiven.”
“I didn’t get—not nothing out of the necklace; and as for the other things, they’ve frighted me so, that I let ’em all go for just what I tell you. And as for Mr. Smiler—I never didn’t care for him; that I didn’t. He ain’t the man to touch my heart—not at all; and it was not likely either. A plain fellow—very, Mr. Gager.”
“He’ll be plainer before long, my dear.”
“But I’ve been that worrited among ’em, Mr. Gager, since first they made their wicked prepositions, that I’ve been jest—I don’t know how I’ve been. And though my lady was not a lady as any girl could like, and did deserve to have her things took if anybody’s things ever should be took, still, Mr. Gager, I knows I did wrong. I do know it—and I’m a-repenting of it in sackcloth and ashes;—so I am. But you’ll be as good as your word, Mr. Gager?”
It must be acknowledged that Mr. Gager had bidden high for success, and had allowed himself to be carried away by his zeal almost to the verge of imprudence. It was essential to him that he should take Patience Crabstick back with him to London—and that he should take her as a witness and not as a criminal. Mr. Benjamin was the game at which he was flying—Mr. Benjamin, and, if possible, Lord George; and he conceived that his net might be big enough to hold Smiler as well as the other two greater fishes, if he could induce Patience Crabstick and Billy Cann to cooperate with him cordially in his fishing.
But his mind was still disturbed on one point. Let him press his beloved Patience as closely as he might with questions, there was one point on which he could not get from her what he believed to be the truth. She persisted that Lord George de Bruce Carruthers had had no hand in either robbery, and Gager had so firmly committed himself to a belief on this matter, that he could not throw the idea away from him, even on the testimony of Patience Crabstick.
On that evening he returned triumphant to Scotland Yard with Patience Crabstick under his wing; and that lady was housed there with every comfort she could desire, except that of personal liberty.
LIX
Mr. Gowran Up in London
In the meantime Mrs. Hittaway was diligently spreading a report that Lizzie Eustace either was engaged to marry her cousin Frank—or ought to be so engaged. This she did, no doubt, with the sole object of saving her brother; but she did it with a zeal that dealt as freely with Frank’s name as with Lizzie’s. They, with all their friends, were her enemies, and she was quite sure that they were, altogether, a wicked, degraded set of people. Of Lord George and Mrs. Carbuncle, of Miss Roanoke and Sir Griffin Tewett, she believed all manner of evil. She had theories of her own about the jewels, stories—probably of her own manufacture in part, although no doubt she believed them to be true—as to the manner of living at Portray, little histories of Lizzie’s debts, and the great fact of the scene which Mr. Gowran had seen with his own eyes. Lizzie Eustace was an abomination to her, and this abominable woman her brother was again in danger of marrying! She was very loud in her denunciations, and took care that they should reach even Lady Linlithgow, so that poor Lucy Morris might
