BRITISH MYSTERIES - Fergus Hume Collection: 21 Thriller Novels in One Volume. Fergus Hume

hands, “that didn’t badger me ‘bout my soul, but gave me good food to eat. I gave ‘em a wrong name. I was so ‘fraid of that Army a-findin’ me. Then I got ill, an’ knowd nothin’ for weeks. They said I was orf my chump. An’ then I came back ‘ere to see gran’.”

      “Cuss ye,” said the old woman, but in such a tender tone that it sounded like a blessing.

      “And did the people who took you in never tell you anything about the murder?” asked Calton.

      Sal shook her head.

      “No, it were a long way in the country, and they never knowd anythin’, they didn’t.”

      “Ah! that explains it,” muttered Calton to himself.

      “Come, now,” he said cheerfully, “tell me all that happened on the night you brought Mr. Fitzgerald to see the ‘Queen.’”

      “Who’s ‘e?” asked Sal, puzzled.

      “Mr. Fitzgerald, the gentleman you brought the letter for to the Melbourne Club.”

      “Oh, ‘im?” said Sal, a sudden light breaking over her wan face. “I never knowd his name afore.”

      Calton nodded complacently.

      “I knew you didn’t,” he said, “that’s why you didn’t ask for him at the Club.”

      “She never told me ‘is name,” said Sal, jerking her head in the direction of the bed.

      “Then whom did she ask you to bring to her?” asked Calton, eagerly.

      “No one,” replied the girl. “This was the way of it. On that night she was orfil ill, an’ I sat beside ‘er while gran’ was asleep.”

      “I was drunk,” broke in gran’, fiercely, “none of yer lies; I was blazin’ drunk.”

      “An’ ses she to me, she ses,” went on the girl, indifferent to her grandmother’s interruption, “‘Get me some paper an’ a pencil, an’ I’ll write a note to ‘im, I will.’ So I goes an’ gits ‘er what she arsks fur out of gran’s box.”

      “Stole it, cuss ye,” shrieked the old hag, shaking her fist.

      “Hold your tongue,” said Kilsip, in a peremptory tone.

      Mother Guttersnipe burst into a volley of oaths, and having run rapidly through all she knew, subsided into a sulky silence.

      “She wrote on it,” went on Sal, “an’ then arsked me to take it to the Melbourne Club an’ give it to ‘im. Ses I, ‘Who’s ‘im?’ Ses she, ‘It’s on the letter; don’t you arsk no questions an’ you won’t ‘ear no lies, but give it to ‘im at the Club, an’ wait for ‘im at the corner of Bourke Street and Russell Street.’ So out I goes, and gives it to a cove at the Club, an’ then ‘e comes along, an’ ses ‘e, ‘Take me to ‘er,’ and I tooked ‘im.”

      “And what like was the gentleman?”

      “Oh, werry good lookin’,” said Sal. “Werry tall, with yeller ‘air an’ moustache. He ‘ad party clothes on, an’ a masher coat, an’ a soft ‘at.”

      “That’s Fitzgerald right enough,” muttered Calton. “And what did he do when he came?”

      “He goes right up to ‘er, and she ses, ‘Are you ‘e?’ and ‘e ses, ‘I am.’ Then ses she, ‘Do you know what I’m a-goin’ to tell you?’ an’ ‘e says, ‘No.’ Then she ses, ‘It’s about ‘er;’ and ses ‘e, lookin’ very white, ”Ow dare you ‘ave ‘er name on your vile lips?’ an’ she gits up an’ screeches, ‘Turn that gal out, an’ I’ll tell you;’ an’ ‘e takes me by the arm, an’ ses ‘e, ”Ere git out,’ an’ I gits out, an’ that’s all I knows.”

      “And how long was he with her?” asked Calton, who had been listening attentively.

      “‘Bout arf-a-hour,” answered Sal. “I takes ‘im back to Russell Street ‘bout twenty-five minutes to two, ‘cause I looked at the clock on the Post Office, an’ ‘e gives me a sov., an’ then he goes a-tearin’ up the street like anything.”

      “Take him about twenty minutes to walk to East Melbourne,” said Calton to himself “So he must just have got in at the time Mrs. Sampson said. He was in with the ‘Queen’ the whole time, I suppose?” he asked, looking keenly at Sal.

      “I was at that door,” said Sal, pointing to it, “an’ ‘e couldn’t ‘ave got out unless I’d seen ‘im.”

      “Oh, it’s all right,” said Calton, nodding to Kilsip, “there won’t be any difficulty in proving an ALIBI. But I say,” he added, turning to Sal, “what were they talking about?”

      “I dunno,” answered Sal. “I was at the door, an’ they talks that quiet I couldn’t ‘ear ‘em. Then he sings out, ‘My G—, it’s too horrible!’ an’ I ‘ear ‘er a larfin’ like to bust, an’ then ‘e comes to me, and ses, quite wild like, ‘Take me out of this ‘ell!’ an’ I tooked ‘im.”

      “And when you came back?”

      “She was dead.”

      “Dead?”

      “As a blessed door-nail,” said Sal, cheerfully.

      “An’ I never knowd I was in the room with a corpse,” wailed Mother Guttersnipe, waking up. “Cuss ‘er, she was allays a-doin’ contrary things.”

      “How do you know?” said Calton, sharply, as he rose to go.

      “I knowd ‘er longer nor you,” croaked the old woman, fixing one evil eye on the lawyer; “an’ I know what you’d like to know; but ye shan’t, ye shan’t.”

      Calton turned from her with a shrug of his shoulders.

      “You will come to the Court to-morrow with Mr. Kilsip,” he said to Sal, “and tell what you have just now told me.”

      “It’s all true, s’elp me,” said Sal, eagerly; “‘e was ‘ere all the time.”

      Calton stepped towards the door, followed by the detective, when Mother Guttersnipe rose.

      “Where’s the money for finin’ her?” she screeched, pointing one skinny finger at Sal.

      “Well, considering the girl found herself,” said Calton, dryly, “the money is in the bank, and will remain there.”

      “An’ I’m to be done out of my ‘ard earned tin, s’elp me?” howled the old fury. “Cuss ye, I’ll ‘ave the lawr of ye, and get ye put in quod.”

      “You’ll go there yourself if you don’t take care,” said Kilsip, in his soft, purring tones.

      “Yah!” shrieked Mother Guttersnipe, snapping her fingers at him. “What do I care about yer quod? Ain’t I bin in Pentrig’, an’ it ain’t ‘urt me, it ain’t? I’m as lively as a gal, I am.”

      And the old fury, to prove the truth of her words, danced a kind of war dance in front of Mr. Calton, snapping her fingers and yelling out curses, as an accompaniment to her ballet. Her luxurious white hair streamed out during her gyrations, and with her grotesque appearance and the faint light of the candle, she presented a gruesome spectacle.

      Calton remembered the tales he had heard of the women of Paris, at the revolution, and the way they danced “La Carmagnole.” Mother Guttersnipe would have been in her element in that sea of blood and turbulence he thought. But he merely shrugged his shoulders, and walked out of the room, as with a final curse, delivered in a hoarse voice, Mother Guttersnipe sank exhausted on the floor, and yelled for gin.

Chapter XIX.