GABRIEL CONROY.*
BY BRET HARTE.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
IN WHICH MR. DUMPHY TAKES POINSETT
INTO HIS CONFIDENCE.
The cool weather of the morning following Mr. Dumphy's momentous interview with Col. Starbottle, contributed somewhat to restore the former gentleman's tranquillity, which had been considerably disturbed. He had, moreover, a vague recollection of having invited Col. Starbottle to visit him socially, and a nervous dread of meeting this man, whose audacity was equal to his own, in the company of others. Braced, however, by the tonic of the clear exhilarating air, and sustained by the presence of his clerks and the respectful homage of his business associates, he dispatched a note to Arthur Poinsett, requesting an interview. Punctually at the hour named that gentleman presented himself, and was languidly surprised when Mr. Dumphy called his clerk and gave peremptory orders that their interview was not to be disturbed, and to refuse admittance to all other visitors. And then Mr. Dumphy, in a peremptory, practical statement which his business habits and temperament had brought to a perfection that Arthur could not help admiring, presented the details of his interview with Col. Starbottle.
"Now, I want you to help me. I've sent to you for that business purpose. You understand, this is not a matter for the Bank's regular counsel. Now what do you propose?"
"First, let me ask you, do you believe your wife is living?"
"No," said Dumphy promptly, "but of course I don't know."
"Then let me relieve your mind at once, and tell you that she is not."
"You know this to be a fact?" asked Dumphy.
"I do. The body supposed to be Grace Conroy's, and so identified, was your wife's. I recognized it at once, knowing Grace Conroy to have been absent at the culmination of the tragedy."
"And why did you not correct the mistake?"
"That is my business," said Arthur, haughtily, "and I believe I have been invited here to attend to yours. Your wife is dead."
"Then," said Mr. Dumphy, rising with a brisk business air, "if you are willing to testify to that fact, I reckon there is nothing more to be done."
Arthur did not rise, but sat watching Mr. Dumphy with an unmoved face. After a moment Mr. Dumphy sat down again, and looked aggressively but nervously at Arthur.
"Well?" he said, at last.
"Is that all?" asked Arthur, quietly. "Are you willing to go on and establish the fact?"
"Don't know what you mean!" said Dumphy, with an attempted frankness which failed signally.
"One moment, Mr. Dumphy. You are a shrewd business man. Now do you suppose the person—whoever he or she may be—who has sent Col. Starbottle to you, relies alone upon your inability to legally prove your wife's death? May they not calculate somewhat on your indisposition to prove it legally; on the theory that you'd rather not open the case, for instance?"
Mr. Dumphy hesitated a moment, and bit his lip.
"Of course," he said shortly, "there'd be some talk among my enemies about my deserting my wife—"
"And child," suggested Arthur.
"And child," repeated Dumphy, savagely, "and not coming back again—there'd be suthin' in them blasted papers about it, unless I paid 'em, but what's that!—deserting one's wife isn't such a new thing in California."
"That's so," said Arthur, with a sarcasm that was none the less sincere because he felt its applicability to himself.
"But we're not getting on," said Mr. Dumphy, impatiently. "What's to be done? That's what I've sent to you for."
"Now that we know it is not your wife, we must find out who it is that stands back of Col. Starbottle. It is evidently some one who knows at least as much as we do of the facts; we are lucky if they know no more.
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