Читать книгу Charles Peace, or The Adventures of a Notorious Burglar онлайн

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Peace proceeded with his picture frames towards the house of his customer, and John Bristow went in the opposite direction.

“Strange, remarkably strange, my meeting with that man,” he murmured, as he walked along. “And so he knows no more about Bessie and his wife than I do myself. It is altogether most mysterious and incomprehensible, but there’s something in the background which has not yet come to light.”

After delivering his frames he returned to his workshop, where he was occupied for an hour or two. He then sought the hospitable parlour of the “Carved Lion.”

On the following morning, while he was at breakfast in the club-room, Brickett came in and said with much concern—

“This is a sad business at Saltwich.”

“What is that?” inquired Peace, looking up from his smoking and fragrant cup of coffee.

“Ah, of course—​I forgot you haven’t heard.

“No. What is it?”

“A poor fellow has been found in the road in a dying condition.”

“Who is he?”

“No one seems to know. He is a stranger to these parts and is supposed to be a tramp.”