'I
saw him in London last night.'
'He's, for ever, here one hour, and there the next,' returned old John,
after the usual pause to get the question in his mind. 'Sometimes he
walks, and sometimes runs. He's known along the road by everybody, and
sometimes comes here in a cart or chaise, and sometimes riding double.
He comes and goes, through wind, rain, snow, and hail, and on the
darkest nights. Nothing hurts HIM.'
'He goes often to the Warren, does he not?' said the guest carelessly.
'I seem to remember his mother telling me something to that effect
yesterday. But I was not attending to the good woman much.'
'You're right, sir,' John made answer, 'he does. His father, sir, was
murdered in that house.'
'So I have heard,' returned the guest, taking a gold toothpick from his
pocket with the same sweet smile. 'A very disagreeable circumstance for
the family.'
'Very,' said John with a puzzled look, as if it occurred to him, dimly
and afar off, that this might by possibility be a cool way of treating
the subject.
'All the circumstances after a murder,' said the guest soliloquising,
'must be dreadfully unpleasant--so much bustle and disturbance--no
repose--a constant dwelling upon one subject--and the running in and
out, and up and down stairs, intolerable.
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