Had the course adopted to examine him been what it ought to have been, he would not have concealed an incident; as it was, he determined to reserve as much as he could, from Colonel Mires, at least.
Before, however, he could speak, the library door was flung open, and the servant announced in a loud voice--
Your own heart may inform you why, with such a crime as--
My own presence on the spot--the place, the time,
Mr. Chewkle--attired as a traveller about to undertake a long journey--entered the waiting-room of the Great Western Railway Station on the morning following his interview with Nathan Gomer, precisely as the clock pealed the hour of nine. He gazed about him--inspected with unabashed steadfastness the features of the individuals assembled in readiness for the 9.15 train, and then seated himself in a conspicuous situation.
He arranged his hair and his hat: he looked slowly once more at every face, and then, putting the knob of his walking stick to his lips, he fixed his eyes upon a heap of miscellaneous luggage.
At the same hour Nathan presented himself at the gate of the Queen’s Prison, and, in his turn, waited for admission. He took the opportunity of obtaining from one of the officers “on the lock” some particulars respecting Mr. Joshua Maybee, and, immediately the opportunity was afforded him, he made direct for that man’s apartment on the county side of the prison.
Josh Maybee was not afflicted with a mania for early rising; he liked to take out a large share of existence reclining between sheets upon a mattress: he would have preferred a down bed, but that was a luxury unknown to the prison, at least on the county side; he, therefore, went to bed early, and rose late.
He was miserably poor; and, as scarcely anything in the place acknowledged him for master, he had no fear of being robbed--consequently, he slept with his door unlocked. It saved him a trouble night and morning. Nathan Gomer, therefore, entered his room without difficulty, and, closing the door softly behind him, turned the key in the lock. He gazed upon the poor mean prison bed, and upon the pallid old face lying upon the pillow--the eyes closed in sleep. He sighed--for the sallow hue of the man’s features, and the long lines furrowing forehead and cheek, told of long incarceration, and much continued mental suffering.