The breakfast-bell rang as the two girls disappeared--and even Sergeant
Cuff was now obliged to give it up as a bad job! He said to me quietly,
"I shall go to Frizinghall, Mr. Betteredge; and I shall be back before
two." He went his way without a word more--and for some few hours we
were well rid of him.
"You must make it right with Rosanna," Mr. Franklin said to me, when we
were alone. "I seem to be fated to say or do something awkward, before
that unlucky girl. You must have seen yourself that Sergeant Cuff laid
a trap for both of us. If he could confuse ME, or irritate HER into
breaking out, either she or I might have said something which would
answer his purpose. On the spur of the moment, I saw no better way out
of it than the way I took. It stopped the girl from saying anything,
and it showed the Sergeant that I saw through him. He was evidently
listening, Betteredge, when I was speaking to you last night."
He had done worse than listen, as I privately thought to myself. He had
remembered my telling him that the girl was in love with Mr. Franklin;
and he had calculated on THAT, when he appealed to Mr. Franklin's
interest in Rosanna--in Rosanna's hearing.
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