CHAPTER XLI.
A DEAD-LOCK.
The incident of the jewellery of Lady Knighton occasioned much talk. On the evening of the ball it occupied the whole conversation, as the sole topic on which tongues could run and brains work. I say tongues run and brains work and not brains work and tongues run, for the former is the natural order in chatter. It was a subject that was thrashed by a hundred tongues of the dancers. Then it was turned over and rethrashed. Then it was winnowed. The chaff of the tale was blown into the kitchens and servants' halls, it drifted into tap-rooms, where the coachmen and grooms congregated and drank; and there it was rethrashed and rewinnowed.
On the day following the ball, the jewels were returned to Lady Knighton, with a courteous letter from Captain Coppinger, to say that he had obtained them through the well-known Willy Mann, a pedlar who did commissions for the neighborhood, who travelled from Exeter along the south coast of Devon and Cornwall, and returned along the north coast of both counties.
Everyone had made use of this fellow to do commissions, and trustworthy he had always proved. That was not a time when there was a parcels' post, and few could afford the time and the money to run at every requirement to the great cities, where were important shops when they required what could not be obtained in small country towns. He had been employed to match silks, to choose carpets, to bring medicines, to select jewellery, to convey love-letters.
But Willy Mann had, unfortunately, died a month ago, having fallen off a wagon and broken his neck.
Consequently it was not possible to follow up any further the traces of the diamond butterflies. Willy Mann, as was well known, had been a vehicle for conveying sundry valuables from ladies who had lost money at
