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Updated: June 14, 2025
In her kind consideration for the invalid, she deliberately conveyed a false impression, though she spoke nothing more than the simple truth. There had indeed been "some misunderstanding," and Savareen's likeness was certainly not the likeness of Mr. Randall. As matter of fact, Mrs. Savareen had really known a Mr. Randall in Millbrook, who bore no resemblance whatever to her husband.
Her main object, of course, was to ascertain, beyond the possibility of doubt, whether the man calling himself Jack Randall was the man known to her as Reginald Bourchier Savareen. The tenant of the room rose as her visitor entered, and even that slight exertion brought on a hollow cough which was pitiful to hear. "I am sorry to see," gently remarked the visitor, "that you are far from well."
Instead of returning home immediately as he ought to have done, Savareen hung about the tavern all day, drinking more than was good for his constitution, and regaling every boon companion he met with an account of the incivility to which he had been subjected at the hands of the bank clerk.
He was informed by the father that Randall and Savareen were identical, but that the family wished to suppress all talk about the affair as far as possible. He took the hint, and departed on his way homeward, without seeking to probe further into matters in which he had no personal concern. It was hardly to be supposed, however, that the local population would show equal forbearance.
That interview and conversation had actually taken place at eight o'clock on the previous evening, and Savareen had ridden northward from the gate within five minutes afterwards. He could not have proceeded more than a hundred or, at the very outside, two hundred yards further, or he must inevitably have been encountered by Lapierre. How had he contrived to vanish so suddenly out of existence?
A short trot brought him again to the toll-house. The gatekeeper was still sitting smoking at the door. A moment's conference with him was sufficient to convince Lapierre that there could be no question of mistaken identity. "Why," said Jonathan, "I know Mr. Savareen as well as I know my right hand.
His irritable turn and language nettled Savareen, who accordingly took the notes, signed the receipt and left the bank, declaring that "that shop" should be troubled by no further business of his.
The two had not encountered each other. Therefore, one of them had deviated from the road. There had been no deviation on the part of Lapierre, so the deviator must necessarily have been Savareen. But the space of time which had elapsed was too brief to admit of the latter's having ridden more than a hundred yards or thereabouts.
"Yes, yes," interrupted Farmer Donaldson; "Savareen had his tempers, no doubt, when he had been drinking more free than common; but he was a jolly feller, all the same. I wish he was with us at this moment." This sentiment was pretty generally re-echoed all round the festive board. Just then a rather heavy footstep was heard to enter the adjoining bar-room from outside.
I am not prepared to say whether the stepmother received further enlightenment than other people, but if she did she kept her tongue between her teeth like a sensible woman. As for Mrs. Savareen herself, she consistently refrained from speaking on the subject to anyone, and even the most inveterate gossips showed sufficient respect for her feelings to ask her no questions.
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