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

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“We’ve all of us had a narrow escape,” said Maud Ashbrook, “and it will be a warning to us for the future.”

“I’m glad Jane shot the fellow down,” observed the farmer. “She’s a true-hearted, brave girl—​not, mind ye, but it would ha’ bin better for him to have fallen by the hands of one of us men.”

“No, master, no,” cried Jane, in a deprecating tone. “I am the most deeply injured, sick and sore of heart—​I who have sworn to devote the remainder of my life to discover the slayer of James Hopgood—​I was the most fitting person to hunt him down. It has been done, and he will not escape now.”

Jane had given her evidence before the stipendiary magistrates in the clearest and most lucid manner. She swore positively to the prisoner Gregson, whose features she declared had not changed since she saw them so distinctly on that fatal night. Her fellow-servant also identified the prisoner, whom she saw, so she averred, through the back-parlour window at the time Jane had hold of him by the handkerchief.