Great Porter Square: A Mystery. v. 1Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
General
Great Porter Square: A Mystery. v. 1
Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
Detective and mystery stories; Fiction
"That is true. Wait a moment."
He rejoined the woman, and after exchanging a few words with her,
returned to our Reporter.
"You will not publish the address I am about to give you?"
"Not if you do not wish it."
"I do not wish it. We must not play with reputations--especially with
the reputation of a woman. Have you pencil and paper? Thank you. Call
to-night at ten o'clock at this address."
He wrote an address in our Reporter's note-book, and, directly
afterwards, left Leicester Square with his newly-found friend. As he
turned in the direction of Piccadilly, he hailed a cab, into which he
and his companion hastily scrambled.
By ten o'clock that night our Reporter paused before the door of the
house in which he expected to find Antony Cowlrick, and debated with
himself whether he should inquire for the man by name. It was quite
natural, he thought, that a person who had been placed in a position
so unpleasant as Antony Cowlrick should wish to avoid the disagreeable
curiosity of prying eyes and vulgar tongues, and that in a new lodging
he should give another name than his own. The house was situated in one
of the lowest neighbourhoods, where only the poorest people dwell. There
were at least half-a-dozen small bells on the right hand side of the
door, and our Reporter fell into deep disgrace by pulling them one after
another, and bringing down persons whose faces were strange to him.
He felt himself in a difficulty, when, giving a description of the
man and the woman he wished to see, one lodger said, "O, it's the
second-floor back;" and another said, "Oh, it's the third-floor front;"
and another said, "What do yer mean by comin' 'ere at this time o' night
rousing up people as want to be abed and asleep?" Now, this last rebuke
was not taken in good part by our Reporter, whose knowledge of the slums
of London, being somewhat extensive, had led him to the belief that
householders and lodgers in these localities seldom go to bed before
the public-house lights are put out. Sad, indeed, is it to reflect that
the Gin-shop is the Church of the Poor, and that it is open from early
morn till midnight to lead poverty and ignorance to lower and lower
depths, in which it is impossible for purity and innocence to find a
resting place!
At length, in despair, our Reporter, having no alternative, inquired
of a woman in the house whether a person of the name of Cowlrick was
within. The woman looked suspiciously at our Reporter, and said she
would call "her man." Her man came, and our Reporter repeated his
question.
"Cowlrick!" cried the man. "Send I may live if that ain't the name of
the feller as was up at the perlice court for the murder in Great Porter
Square! Yer don't mean to say that it's 'im you've come to inquire for
at a respectable 'ouse?"
"Shut the door in his face, Jim!" called out the woman, from the top of
the stairs.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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