Page:The Mystery of a Hansom Cab.djvu/174

170 time puzzles me. He was not rich, not particularly good-looking, had no position, and a bad temper. How do I know all these traits of Mr. Whyte's character, morally and socially? Easily enough; my omniscient friend found them all out. Mr. Oliver Whyte was the son of a London tailor, and his father being well off, retired into private life, and ultimately went the way of all flesh. His son finding himself with a capital income, and a pretty taste for amusement, cut the shop of his late lamented parent, found out that his family had come over with the Conqueror—Granville de Whyte helped to sew the Bayeux tapestry, I suppose—and graduated at the Frivolity Theatre as a masher. In common with the other gilded youth of the day, he worshiped at the gas-lit shrine of Musette, and the goddess, pleased with his incense, left her other admirers in the lurch, and ran off with fortunate Mr. Whyte. As far as this goes, there is nothing to show why the murder was committed. Men do not perpetrate crimes for the sake of light o'loves like Musette, unless, indeed, some wretched youth embezzles money to buy his divinity jewelry. The career of Musette, in London, was simply that of a clever member of the demi-monde, and, as far as I can learn, no one was so much in love with her as to commit a crime for her sake. So far, so good; the motive of the crime must be found in Australia. Whyte had spent nearly all his money in England, and consequently Musette and her lover arrived in Sydney with comparatively little cash. However, with an Epicurean-like philosophy, they enjoyed themselves on what little they had, and then came to Melbourne, where they stayed at a second rate hotel. Musette, I may tell you, had one special vice, a common one—drink. She loved champagne, and drank a good deal of it. Consequently, on arriving in Melbourne, and finding that a new generation had arisen which knew not Joseph—I mean Musette—she drowned her sorrow in the flowing bowl, and went out after a quarrel with Mr. Whyte to view Melbourne by night, a familiar aspect to her, no doubt. What took her to Little Bourke street I don't know. Perhaps she got lost; perhaps it had been a favorite walk of hers in the old days; at all events she was found dead drunk in that unsavory locality by Sal Rawlins. I know this is so, because Sal told me so herself,