“Far be it from me, Lawyer Lightwood! I was so troubled in my mind, that I wouldn’t have knowed more, no, not for the sum as I expect to earn from you by the sweat of my brow, twice told! I had put an end to the pardnership. I had cut the connexion. I couldn’t undo what was done; and when he begs and prays, ‘Old pardner, on my knees, don’t split upon me!’ I only makes answer ‘Never speak another word to Roger Riderhood, nor look him in the face!’ and I shuns that man.”
Having given these words a swing to make them mount the higher and go the further, Rogue Riderhood poured himself out another glass of wine unbidden, and seemed to chew it, as, with the half- emptied glass in his hand, he stared at the candles.
Mortimer glanced at Eugene, but Eugene sat glowering at his paper, and would give him no responsive glance. Mortimer again turned to the informer, to whom he said:
“You have been troubled in your mind a long time, man?”
Giving his wine a final chew, and swallowing it, the informer answered in a single word:
“Hages!”
“When all that stir was made, when the Government reward was offered, when the police were on the alert, when the whole country rang with the crime!” said Mortimer, impatiently.
“Hah!” Mr Riderhood very slowly and hoarsely chimed in, with several retrospective nods of his head. “Warn’t I troubled in my mind then!”
“When conjecture ran wild, when the most extravagant suspicions were afloat, when half a dozen innocent people might have been laid by the heels any hour in the day!” said Mortimer, almost warming.
“Hah!” Mr Riderhood chimed in, as before. “Warn’t I troubled in my mind through it all!”
“But he hadn’t,” said Eugene, drawing a lady’s head upon his writing-paper, and touching it at intervals, “the opportunity then of earning so much money, you see.”
“The T’other Governor hits the nail, Lawyer Lightwood! It was that as turned me. I had many times and again struggled to relieve myself of the trouble on my mind, but I couldn’t get it off. I had once very nigh got it off to Miss Abbey Potterson which keeps the Six Jolly Fellowships — there is the ’ouse, it won’t run away, — there lives the lady, she ain’t likely to be struck dead afore you get there — ask her! — but I couldn’t do it. At last, out comes the new bill with your own lawful name, Lawyer Lightwood, printed to it, and then I asks the question of my own intellects, Am I to have this trouble on my mind for ever? Am I never to throw it off? Am I always to think more of Gaffer than of my own self? If he’s got a daughter, ain’t I got a daughter?”
“And echo answered—?” Eugene suggested.
“ ‘You have,’ ” said Mr Riderhood, in a firm tone.
“Incidentally mentioning, at the same time, her age?” inquired Eugene.
“Yes, governor. Two-and-twenty last October. And then I put it to myself, ‘Regarding the money. It is a pot of money.’ For it is a pot,” said Mr Riderhood, with candour, “and why deny it?”
“Hear!” from Eugene as he touched his drawing.
“ ‘It is a pot of money; but is it a sin for a labouring man that moistens every crust of bread he earns, with his tears — or if not with them, with the colds he catches in his head — is it a sin for that man to earn it? Say there is anything again earning it.’ This I put to myself strong, as in duty bound; ‘how can