Page:Marie Adelaide Belloc Lowndes - The Lodger.djvu/82

72 two of ’em this time! That’s what I meant when I said I might ’a got a better fare. I wouldn’t say nothink before little missy there, but folk ’ave been coming from all over London the last five or six hours; plenty of toffs, too—but there, there’s nothing to see now!"

"What? Another woman murdered last night?"

Bunting felt tremendously thrilled. What had the five thousand constables been about to let such a dreadful thing happen?

The cabman stared at him, surprised. "Two of ’em, I tell yer—within a few yards of one another. He ’ave got a nerve But, of course, they was drunk. He ’ave got a down on the drink!"

"Have they caught him?" asked Bunting perfunctorily.

"Lord, no! They’ll never catch ’im! It must ’ave happened hours and hours ago—they was both stone cold. One each end of a little passage what ain’t used no more. That’s why they didn’t find ’em before."

The hoarse cries were coming nearer and nearer—two newsvendors trying to outshout each other.

"’Orrible discovery near King’s Cross!" they yelled exultingly. "The Avenger again!"

And Bunting, with his daughter’s large straw hold-all in his hand, ran forward into the roadway and recklessly gave a boy a penny for a halfpenny paper.

He felt very much moved and excited. Somehow his acquaintance with young Joe Chandler made these murders seem a personal affair. He hoped that Chandler would come in soon and tell them all about it, as he had done yesterday morning when he, Bunting, had unluckily been out.