第76章

But I wavers, I can't quite make up my mind.Sometimes I think it's a sailor - the foreigner they talks about, that goes away for eight or nine days in between, to Holland maybe, or to France.Then, again, I says to myself that it's a butcher, a man from the Central Market.Whoever it is, it's someone used to killing, that's flat.""Then it don't seem to you possible - ?" (Bunting got up and walked over to the window.) "You don't take any stock, I suppose, in that idea some of the papers put out, that the man is" - then he hesitated and brought out, with a gasp - "a gentleman?"Chandler looked at him, surprised."No," he said deliberately.

"I've made up my mind that's quite a wrong tack, though I knows that some of our fellows - big pots, too - are quite sure that the fellow what gave the girl the sovereign is the man we're looking for.You see, Mr.Bunting, if that's the fact - well, it stands to reason the fellow's an escaped lunatic; and if he's an escaped lunatic he's got a keeper, and they'd be raising a hue and cry after him; now, wouldn't they?""You don't think," went on Bunting, lowering his voice, "that he could be just staying somewhere, lodging like?"" D'you mean that The Avenger may be a toff, staying in some West-end hotel, Mr.Bunting? Well, things almost as funny as that 'ud be have come to pass." He smiled as if the notion was a funny one.

"Yes, something o' that sort," muttered Bunting.

"Well, if your idea's correct, Mr.- Bunting - ""I never said 'twas my idea," said Bunting, all in a hurry.

"Well, if that idea's correct then, 'twill make our task more difficult than ever.Why, 'twould be looking for a needle in a field of hay, Mr.Bunting! But there! I don't think it's anything quite so unlikely as that - not myself I don't." He hesitated."There's some of us" - he lowered his voice-" that hopes he'll betake himself off - The Avenger, I mean - to another big city, to Manchester or to Edinburgh.There'd be plenty of work for him to do there," and Chandler chuckled at his own grim joke.

And then, to both men's secret relief, for Bunting was now mortally afraid of this discussion concerning The Avenger and his doings, they heard Mrs.Bunting's key in the lock.

Daisy blushed rosy-red with pleasure when she saw that young Chandler was still there.She had feared that when they got home he would be gone, the more so that Ellen, just as if she was doing it on purpose, had lingered aggravatingly long over each small purchase.

"Here's Joe come to ask if he can take Daisy out for a walk,"blurted out Bunting.

"My mother says as how she'd like you to come to tea, over at Richmond," said Chandler awkwardly, "I just come in to see whether we could fix it up, Miss Daisy." And Daisy looked imploringly at her stepmother.

"D'you mean now - this minute?" asked Mrs.Bunting tartly.

"No, o' course not" - Bunting broke in hastily."How you do go on, Ellen!""What day did your mother mention would be convenient to her?"asked Mrs.Bunting, looking at the young man satirically.

Chandler hesitated.His mother had not mentioned any special day - in fact, his mother had shown a surprising lack of anxiety to see Daisy at all.But he had talked her round.

"How about Saturday?" suggested Bunting."That's Daisy's' birthday.

'Twould be a birthday treat for her to go to Richmond, and she's going back to Old Aunt on Monday.""I can't go Saturday," said Chandler disconsolately."I'm on duty Saturday.""Well, then, let it be Sunday," said Bunting firmly.And his wife looked at him surprised; he seldom asserted himself so much in her presence.

"What do you say, Miss Daisy?" said Chandler.

"Sunday would be very nice," said Daisy demurely.And then, as the young man took up his hat, and as her stepmother did not stir, Daisy ventured to go out into the hall with him for a minute.

Chandler shut the door behind them, and so was spared the hearing of Mrs.Bunting's whispered remark: "When I was a young woman folk didn't gallivant about on Sunday; those who was courting used to go to church together, decent-like - "