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Updated: June 11, 2025
Crotin had his fork half-way to his mouth, but put it down again. "I don't know much about the case personally," said Pinto carelessly, "but the circumstances were brought to my notice by a friend. I think these people suffer more than we imagine; and I'll let you into a secret, Lady Sybil," he said, speaking impressively.
"I'm going to give myself up and I'm going to pinch thee too!" If Crotin had turned the handle of the old-fashioned telephone, if he had continued in his resolution, if he had shown no sign of doubt, a different story might have been told. But with his hand raised, he hesitated, and Pinto clinched his argument. "Why have all that trouble?" he said.
She had searched her mind to recall all the qualms she had felt in her long association with the Boundary Gang, and took an unusual pleasure in her strange recollection. She remembered when she had refused to be drawn into the Crotin fraud; she recalled her stormy interview with the colonel when she declined to take a part in the ruining of young Debenham.
"Anyway, that's long ago, and if he'd made a discovery, why, I think we should have heard about it. Now, Pinto," his tone changed "I'm not going to talk to you about Crotin. You've made a proper mess of it, and I ought never to have sent you. We have two matters to settle. Crewe wants to get out, and I think you're getting ready to bolt." "Me?" said Pinto with virtuous indignation.
"I'm thinking of the poor woman in Wales, too, and the poor woman in there." He jerked his head. Then, in a calmer tone: "I guessed at dinner where you came from. Colonel Boundary sent you." Pinto shrugged. "Let us mention no names," he said politely. "And who is Colonel Boundary, anyway?" Crotin was at his desk now. He had taken out his cheque-book and slapped it down upon the writing-pad.
"You've got me, mister. So that is how you do it!" "That is how I do it," said the colonel. "I believe in being frank with people like you. Here are the transfers. You see the place for your signature marked with a pencil." Suddenly Crotin leaped at him in a blind fury, but the colonel gripped him by the throat with a hand like a steel vice, and shook him as a dog would shake a rat.
"Have your own way, love," said Mr. Crotin meekly. "Besides," she said, "it would be all over the town that it was your money which was coming in, and these horrid people would be laughing at me." She finished buttoning her gloves and was looking at him curiously. "What is the matter with you, John?" she asked suddenly, and he almost jumped.
"It was no more than I expected," she said bitterly. "I was a fool ever to start the thing this is the last time I ever attempt to help local charities." Mr. Crotin rubbed his bald head in perplexity. "They'll come," he said hopefully, referring to the patrons whose absence was the cause of Lady Sybil's annoyance. "They'll come when they hear what a fine show it is.
"I don't see how you can say they've no evidence against you. Suppose Crotin squeals?" "He ain't stopped squealing yet," said the colonel philosophically, "but I don't see what difference it makes. Pinto, you haven't got the hang of my methods, and I doubt if you ever will. You're a clever, useful fellow, but if you were allowed to run the gang, you'd have it in gaol in a month.
Thomas Crotin, of the firm of Crotin and Principle, whose swollen mills occupy a respectable acreage in Huddersfield and Dewsbury. "You're Colonel Boundary, are you?" he said admiringly, and for about the seventh time since the meal started. The colonel nodded with a good-humoured twinkle in his eye. "Well, fancy that!" said Mr. Crotin.
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