Chapter 27 - Page 2

his table, which is set on one side of the fire, and takes his easy chair. “Cold and raw this morning, cold and raw!” Mr Tulkinghorn warms before the bars, alternately, the palms and knuckles of his hands, and looks (from behind that blind which is always down) at the trio sitting in a little semicircle before him.

“Now, I can feel what I am about” (as perhaps he can in two senses), “Mr Smallweed.” The old gentleman is newly shaken up by Judy, to bear his part in the conversation. “You have brought our good friend the serjeant, I see.”

“Yes, sir,” returns Mr Smallweed, very servile to the lawyer’s wealth and influence.

“And what does the serjeant say about this business?”

“Mr George,” says Grandfather Smallweed, with a tremulous wave of his shrivelled hand, “this is the gentleman, sir.”

Mr George salutes the gentleman; but otherwise sits bolt upright and profoundly silent — very forward in his chair, as if the full complement of regulation appendages for a field day hung about him.

Mr Tulkinghorn proceeds: “Well, George? — I believe your name is George?”

“It is so, Sir.”

“What do you say, George?”

“I ask your pardon, sir,” returns the trooper, “but I should wish to know what you say?”

“Do you mean in point of reward?”

“I mean in point of everything, sir.”

This is so very trying to Mr Smallweed’s temper, that he suddenly breaks out with “You’re a Brimstone beast!” and as suddenly asks pardon of Mr Tulkinghorn; excusing himself for this slip of the tongue, by saying to Judy, “I was thinking of your grandmother, my dear.”

“I supposed, serjeant,” Mr Tulkinghorn resumes, as he leans on one side of his chair and crosses his legs, “that Mr Smallweed might have sufficiently explained the matter. It lies in the smallest compass, however. You served under Captain Hawdon at one time, and were his attendant in illness, and rendered him many little services, and were rather in his confidence, I am told. That is so, is it not?”

“Yes, sir, that is so,” says Mr George, with military brevity.

“Therefore you may happen to have in your possession something — anything, no matter what — accounts, instructions, orders, a letter, anything — in Captain Hawdon’s writing. I wish to compare his writing with some that I have. If you can give me the opportunity, you shall be rewarded for your trouble. Three, four, five, guineas, you would consider handsome, I dare say.”

“Noble, my dear friend!” cries Grandfather Smallweed, screwing up his