I went in, and found Murray Olivant lounging in a deep chair before the
fire; Jervis Fanshawe stood at a little distance from him, a shabby
figure indeed in contrast to the other man. Olivant was smoking a big
cigar, which he was nervously turning over and over between his teeth,
the while he frowned at me through the smoke. I did not speak; I waited
again while they discussed what was to be done with me, in that fashion
they had used before, quite as though I were a piece of furniture that
had been purchased, and for which a place had to be found.
"You'll have to get him some clothes--something dark and respectable,"
said Olivant. "Get them to-day; he must go down to Hammerstone Market
to-night, taking my luggage. Also he'll take a letter from me to Savell;
I shall follow to-morrow. Does he remember where the place is, do you
think? You Tinman," he called to me; "do you know where Hammerstone
Market is?"
"I remember it, sir," I replied.
"You'll have enough money given you to take you down there; you will
remember that you are Tinman, my personal servant. You'll have no
difficulty about it; they'll put you up at the house. Fanshawe will take
you out now, and rig you up properly; you'll be back here by six
o'clock. Your train leaves at a few minutes to seven." He turned to
Jervis Fanshawe, and spoke impatiently. "Do you think the idiot
understands?"
"Perfectly," was the reply. "You don't want him too sharp, you know."
"You're doing splendidly," said Fanshawe, when we were outside the place
again. "I can see that you'll be just the very man to do the work he
wants; you'll play the dumb dog, and do what you're told, and ask no
questions, won't you?"
"Of course," I replied; but I think he was a little disappointed that I
should appear to take so little interest in this new life that was being
mapped out for me.
Some clothing was bought for me at a second-hand dealer's, and I was
rigged out cheaply to fit my new position. I did not see Murray Olivant
when I went back to his rooms; his manservant pointed to the luggage
that had been packed, and gave me a letter addressed to Lucas Savell,
and some money. At the last moment before opening the door the man
plucked me by the sleeve, and drew me back, and whispered--
"I say, who are you? and what are you supposed to be? Hang me if I can
make you out."
"It isn't necessary," I replied; "I don't know myself." I went out of
the place, carrying some of the luggage, and leaving him to follow with
the rest.
A cab was called, and I started; my last vision of the servant was
seeing him standing on the pavement outside the house, scratching his
chin and staring perplexedly after me. But, in my deeper anxiety as to
what was going to happen to me in that strange house at Hammerstone
Market, I forgot his very existence by the time the cab had turned the
corner.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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