I could have taken my oath that I saw Mr. Luker pass something to an
elderly gentleman, in a light-coloured paletot. The elderly gentleman
turns out, sir, to be a most respectable master iron-monger in
Eastcheap."
"Where is Gooseberry?" asked Mr. Bruff resignedly.
The man stared. "I don't know, sir. I have seen nothing of him since I
left the bank."
Mr. Bruff dismissed the man. "One of two things," he said to me. "Either
Gooseberry has run away, or he is hunting on his own account. What do
you say to dining here, on the chance that the boy may come back in an
hour or two? I have got some good wine in the cellar, and we can get a
chop from the coffee-house."
We dined at Mr. Bruff's chambers. Before the cloth was removed, "a
person" was announced as wanting to speak to the lawyer. Was the person
Gooseberry? No: only the man who had been employed to follow Mr. Luker
when he left the bank.
The report, in this case, presented no feature of the slightest
interest. Mr. Luker had gone back to his own house, and had there
dismissed his guard. He had not gone out again afterwards. Towards dusk,
the shutters had been put up, and the doors had been bolted.
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