Within the Maze: A Novel, Vol. 2 (of 2)Wood, Henry, Mrs.
General
Within the Maze: A Novel, Vol. 2 (of 2)
Wood, Henry, Mrs.
English fiction -- 19th century
The five minutes were occupied with Tatton; but, he was safely away
ere they had expired, carrying with him his orders to wait; and Sir
Karl Andinnian was shown in. The superintendent and the visitor met
for the first time, and glanced at each other with some curiosity. The
officer saw, in the brother of the noted and unfortunate criminal, a
pale, refined, and essentially gentlemanly man, with a sad but
attractive face that seemed to tell of sorrow; the other saw a spare
man of middle height, who in age might have been his father, and whose
speech and manners betokened a cultivation as good as his own.
Taking the seat offered him, Karl entered at once upon his business.
Explaining shortly and truthfully the unfortunate suspicion on his own
part, that had led to his inquiries about Salter of Mr. Burtenshaw,
and to the subsequent dispatch of Tatton to Foxwood. He concealed
nothing; not even the slight foundation for those suspicions--merely
the having seen the name of Philip Salter in a pocket-book that was in
the possession of Philip Smith; and related his recent explanation
with Smith; when he learnt that he and Salter were cousins. Karl told
it all: and the officer saw, and believed, that he was telling it
truly. Karl then went on to relate how he had himself sought an
interview with Tatton on his last return from London--whither he had
gone to try and convince Mr. Burtenshaw that it was not Salter; that
he had learnt from Tatton then that his suspicions were directed to a
house called the Maze, as the place of Salter's concealment, and that
he, Sir Karl, had assured Tatton on his word of honour as a gentleman
that it was altogether a mistaken assumption, for that Salter was not
at the Maze, and never had been there. He had believed that Tatton was
convinced by what he said: instead of which, he had taken the extreme
and, under the circumstances, most unjustifiable step of proceeding to
the house with a search warrant and two policemen, to the terror of
the lady inhabiting it, Mrs. Grey, and her two old servants. It was to
report this to Tatton's superiors at headquarters that he had now
come up from Foxwood, Sir Karl added; not, he emphatically said, to
complain of Mr. Tatton or to get him reprimanded, for no doubt the
man, in doing what he had done, had believed it was but his duty: but
to request that instructions might be given him to leave Mrs. Grey in
tranquillity for the future. She, feeling much outraged and insulted
by the suspicion that she could have a common criminal like Philip
Salter concealed in her home, had sent for him, Sir Karl, as her
landlord, to beg him to protect her if in his power, and to secure her
from further molestation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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