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Making his way around the castle, keeping close to the walls, so as not to be seen from the high windows by any one inside, Holmes led me out to the stables. Here I hid myself in one of the horses' stalls, and Holmes walked into another one, where he found fat little Olaf Yensen, the first coachman, currying one of the noble steeds.
"I want you to come over to my house to marry me to Lena Yensen." "No, I can't, it would kill an ox to go out in a storm like this, and my rheumatism is bad tonight." "Then if you will not go I must take you," said Canute with a sigh. He took down the preacher's bearskin coat and bade him put it on while he hitched up his buggy. He went out and closed the door softly after him.
I now came out of my hiding-place in the next stall, and accompanied the strange procession into the castle: Yensen, holding his hands up, his face almost green with fright, in front; Holmes, with his drawn revolver pointed at him, immediately behind, and yours truly bringing up the rear, while the bulldog barked loudly at us from his kennel next to the stalls.
Then my partner added: "Of course, I couldn't exactly swear to it yet that Eustace is the guilty gink we are after, but I'm going to disguise myself as a race-track follower and go out and talk 'horses' to the two coachmen, Yensen and Linescu, and we'll probably learn some more. I've found a good many other clues on the other shoes, which I will not divulge into your capacious ears until later.
Yensen looked up to reply, chanced to glance aft, and dropped his calking iron in his astonishment. "Yumping Yimminy! Luk at dat fallar!" Hogan looked. "The deuce! That's a man after me own heat-rt! Kape yore pagan mouth shut! If ye take a hand agin 'em I'll swab up the deck wid yez. G'wan wor-rking like a sane man, ye ijit!" "Ay ent ban fight wit dat fallar! Luk at the gun!"
And he grabbed up the glittering jewel from the floor, and confronted the astounded and frightened Yensen. "So the horse was born with a diamond on his hoof, eh? That beats a baby's being born with a golden spoon in its mouth, as they say some of them are. But hold on a minute, O faithful confidant of the Australian crook. My name isn't really Dick Henderson.
"Well, you don't need to bite my head off about it," grumbled Addie, as she went out, and her place was taken by a cheerful and rubicund coachman, the same one who had driven us up from the station the day before. "What's your name, antecedents, and knowledge as to the diamond-theft?" Holmes demanded. "Vell, Ay bane Olaf Yensen, from Aalesund, Norvay. Ay bane the Earl's first coachman.
"Well, Doc," said Holmes, as he took out his pocket-knife, pulled a sliver of wood off the tree-trunk we were sitting on, and began to whittle it, "the red clay I found on Eustace Thorneycroft's shoes was pretty good evidence that he had been around the stable, where the only red clay in the neighborhood is located; so I disguised myself as the race-track loafer and pried his secret out of the none too bright Olaf Yensen, the coachman.
Canute remained standing with his hat on and said quietly, "I want you to come over to my house tonight to marry me to Lena Yensen." "Have you got a license, Canute?" "No, I don't want a license. I want to be married." "But I can't marry you without a license, man, it would not be legal." A dangerous light came in the big Norwegian's eye.
Hogan, A. B., stated the feelings of his companions very well in his remarks to the men who worked alongside: "In me hear-rt I'm dommed glad av it, Yensen. I hope they bate the old man at his own game. 'T is a shame in these days for honest men to be took in that unlawful way. I've heard me father tell of the press gangs on the other side, an' 't is small business."
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