FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178  
179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   >>   >|  
itself in every line of her face; and I knew that Sergeant Cuff would meet his match, when a woman like my mistress was strung up to hear the worst he could say to her. CHAPTER XXI The first words, when we had taken our seats, were spoken by my lady. "Sergeant Cuff," she said, "there was perhaps some excuse for the inconsiderate manner in which I spoke to you half an hour since. I have no wish, however, to claim that excuse. I say, with perfect sincerity, that I regret it, if I wronged you." The grace of voice and manner with which she made him that atonement had its due effect on the Sergeant. He requested permission to justify himself--putting his justification as an act of respect to my mistress. It was impossible, he said, that he could be in any way responsible for the calamity, which had shocked us all, for this sufficient reason, that his success in bringing his inquiry to its proper end depended on his neither saying nor doing anything that could alarm Rosanna Spearman. He appealed to me to testify whether he had, or had not, carried that object out. I could, and did, bear witness that he had. And there, as I thought, the matter might have been judiciously left to come to an end. Sergeant Cuff, however, took it a step further, evidently (as you shall now judge) with the purpose of forcing the most painful of all possible explanations to take place between her ladyship and himself. "I have heard a motive assigned for the young woman's suicide," said the Sergeant, "which may possibly be the right one. It is a motive quite unconnected with the case which I am conducting here. I am bound to add, however, that my own opinion points the other way. Some unbearable anxiety in connexion with the missing Diamond, has, I believe, driven the poor creature to her own destruction. I don't pretend to know what that unbearable anxiety may have been. But I think (with your ladyship's permission) I can lay my hand on a person who is capable of deciding whether I am right or wrong." "Is the person now in the house?" my mistress asked, after waiting a little. "The person has left the house," my lady. That answer pointed as straight to Miss Rachel as straight could be. A silence dropped on us which I thought would never come to an end. Lord! how the wind howled, and how the rain drove at the window, as I sat there waiting for one or other of them to speak again! "Be so good as to express yourself plainly
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178  
179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   191   192   193   194   195   196   197   198   199   200   201   202   203   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Sergeant
 

person

 

mistress

 
waiting
 

manner

 

motive

 

permission

 

unbearable

 

anxiety

 

ladyship


thought

 
straight
 

excuse

 
Diamond
 
painful
 

missing

 

connexion

 

unconnected

 

possibly

 

suicide


assigned

 

explanations

 

opinion

 

points

 

conducting

 
capable
 

howled

 

dropped

 

Rachel

 

silence


window

 

express

 
plainly
 

pointed

 

answer

 

pretend

 

creature

 

destruction

 

forcing

 

deciding


driven
 
Spearman
 

inconsiderate

 

perfect

 

sincerity

 
atonement
 

effect

 
regret
 
wronged
 

spoken