“I told you he was a liar,” said Fairholme contemptuously.
“Well, I expect he’s seen something,” said the inspector, “but what it was, or who it was, is more than I can get out of him.”
There was a pause, and they looked askance upon Wickens’s boy. His account of the kissing made it almost an insult to the Janseniuses to identify with Henrietta the person he had seen. Jane suggested dragging the canal, but was silenced by an indignant “sh-sh-sh,” accompanied by apprehensive and sympathetic glances at the bereaved parents. She was displaced from the focus of attention by the appearance of the two policemen who had been sent to the chalet. Smilash was between them, apparently a prisoner. At a distance, he seemed to have suffered some frightful injury to his head, but when he was brought into the midst of the company it appeared that he had twisted a red handkerchief about his face as if to soothe a toothache. He had a particularly hangdog expression as he stood before the inspector with his head bowed and his countenance averted from Mr. Jansenius, who, attempting to scrutinize his features, could see nothing but a patch of red handkerchief.
One of the policemen described how they had found Smilash in the act of entering his dwelling; how he had refused to give any information or to go to the college, and had defied them to take him there against his will; and how, on their at last proposing to send for the inspector and Mr. Jansenius, he had called them asses, and consented to accompany them. The policeman concluded by declaring that the man was either drunk or designing, as he could not or would not speak sensibly.
“Look here, governor,” began Smilash to the inspector, “I am a common man — no commoner goin’, as you may see for—”
“That’s ‘im,” cried Wickens’s boy, suddenly struck with a sense of his own importance as a witness. “That’s ‘im that the lady kissed, and that gev me tuppence and threatened to drownd me.”
“And with a ‘umble and contrite ‘art do I regret that I did not drownd you, you young rascal,” said Smilash. “It ain’t manners to interrupt a man who, though common, might be your father for years and wisdom.”
“Hold your tongue,” said the inspector to the boy. “Now, Smilash, do you wish to make any statement? Be careful, for whatever you say may be used against you hereafter.”
“If you was to lead me straight away to the scaffold, colonel, I could tell you no more than the truth. If any man can say that he has heard Jeff Smilash tell a lie, let him stand forth.”
“We don’t want to hear about that,” said the inspector. “As you are a stranger in these parts, nobody here knows any bad of you. No more do they know any good of you neither.”
“Colonel,” said Smilash, deeply impressed, “you have a penetrating mind, and you know a bad character at sight. Not to deceive you, I am that given to lying, and laziness, and self-indulgence of all sorts, that the only excuse I can find for myself is that it is the nature of the race so to be; for most men is just as bad as me, and some of ’em worsen I do not speak pers’nal to you, governor, nor to the honorable gentlemen here assembled. But then you, colonel, are a hinspector of police, which I take to be more than merely human; and as to the gentlemen here, a gentleman ain’t a man — leastways not a common man — the common man bein’ but the slave wot feeds and clothes the gentleman beyond the common.”
“Come,” said the inspector, unable to follow these observations, “you are a clever dodger, but you can’t dodge me. Have you any statement to make with reference to the lady that was last seen in your company?”
“Take a statement about a lady!” said Smilash indignantly. “Far be the thought from my mind!”
“What have you done with her?” said Agatha, impetuously. “Don’t be silly.”
“You’re not bound to answer that, you know,” said the inspector, a little put out by Agatha’s taking advantage of her irresponsible unofficial position to come so directly to the point. “You may if you like, though. If you’ve done any harm, you’d better hold your tongue. If not, you’d better say so.”
“I will set the young lady’s mind at rest respecting her honorable sister,” said Smilash. “When the young lady caught sight of me she fainted. Bein’ but a young man, and not used to ladies, I will not deny but that I were a bit scared, and that my mind were not open to the sensiblest considerations. When she unveils her orbs, so to speak, she ketches me round the neck, not knowin’ me from Adam the father of us all, and sez, ‘Bring me some water, and don’t let the girls see me.’ Through not ‘avin’ the intelligence to think for myself, I done just what she told me. I ups with her in my arms — she bein’ a light weight and a slender figure — and makes for the canal as fast as I could. When I got there, I lays her on the bank and goes for the water. But what with factories, and pollutions, and high civilizations of one sort and another, English canal water ain’t fit to sprinkle on a lady, much less for her to drink. Just then, as luck would have it, a barge came along and took her aboard, and—”
“To such a thing,” said Wickens’s boy stubbornly, emboldened by witnessing the effrontery of one apparently of his own class. “I sor you two standin’ together, and her a kissin’ of you. There worn’s no barge.”
“Is the maiden modesty of a born lady to be disbelieved on the word of a common boy that only walks the earth by the sufferance of the landlords and moneylords he helps to feed?” cried Smilash indignantly. “Why, you young infidel, a lady ain’t made of common brick like you. She don’t know what a kiss means, and if she did, is it likely that she’d kiss me when a fine man like the inspector here would be only too happy to oblige her. Fie, for shame! The barge were red and yellow, with a green dragon for a figurehead, and a white horse towin’ of it. Perhaps you’re color-blind, and can’t distinguish red and yellow. The bargee was moved to compassion by the sight of the poor faintin’ lady, and the offer of ‘arf-a-crown, and he had a mother that acted as a mother should. There was a cabin in that barge about as big as the locker where your ladyship keeps your jam and pickles, and in that locker the bargee lives, quite domestic, with his wife and mother and five children. Them canal boats is what you may call the wooden walls of England.”
“Come, get on with your story,” said the inspector. “We know what barges is as well as you.”
“I wish more knew of ‘em,” retorted Smilash; “perhaps it ‘ud lighten your work a bit. However, as I was sayin’, we went right down the canal to Lyvern, where we got off, and the lady she took the railway omnibus and went away in it. With the noble openhandedness of her class, she gave me sixpence; here it is, in proof that my words is true. And I wish her safe home, and if I was on the rack I could tell no more, except that when I got back I were laid hands on by these here bobbies, contrary to the British constitooshun, and if your ladyship will kindly go to where that constitooshun is wrote down, and find out wot it sez about my rights and liberties — for I have been told that the working-man has his liberties, and have myself seen plenty took with him — you will oblige a common chap more than his education will enable him to express.”
“Sir,” cried Mr. Jansenius suddenly, “will you hold up your head and look me in the face?”
Smilash did so, and immediately started theatrically, exclaiming, “Whom do I see?”
“You would hardly believe it,” he continued, addressing the company at large, “but I am well beknown to this honorable gentleman. I see it upon your lips, governor, to ask after my missus, and I thank you for your condescending interest. She is well, sir, and my residence here is fully agreed upon between us. What little cloud may have rose upon our domestic horizon has past away; and, governor,” — here Smilash’s voice fell with graver emphasis— “them as interferes betwixt man and wife now will incur a heavy responsibility. Here I am, such as you see me, and here I mean to stay, likewise such as you see me. That is, if what you may call destiny permits. For