Opposite her sat the man in drab, swinging his hat between his knees and
looking exactly as if he had just been awakened from a nap. The man
walked to the door, locked it, and then resumed his seat.
'Now, my lad,' he said, 'attend to me. My name is Downy. I am a
detective, and I have found you out.'
The admission was not a wise one; it blanched Dick's lips, but it closed
them like a spring-trap.
'I have found you out,' continued the detective. 'He has been arrested.'
The detective emphasised the 'he,' and watched the effect. Dick stood
before him, white and silent, his heart beating with quick blows, and his
blood humming in his ears, 'Who? Who? Who?'
'The man who went down with you has been arrested, my lad, and now you
must tell me the whole truth to save yourself. He says you hammered Harry
Hardy on the head with an iron bar, and if you do not clear yourself I
must take you to gaol.'
Dick answered nothing; his eyes never moved from the green bee on the
wall even to glance at his mother sobbing in the corner.
'Come, come, come!' cried Downy impatiently, 'it's no good your denying
that you were in the mine on Sunday night. You came home covered with
slurry, marked with blood, and very frightened. Your mother admits that,
and we have found your footprints in the clay of the Silver Stream drives
at both levels.
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