'Why look here,' hooking his proposition on his left-hand fingers with the forefinger of his right. 'There's two Governors, ain't there?
One and one, two--Lawyer Lightwood, my first finger, he's one, ain't he? Well; might you be acquainted with my middle finger, the T'other?'
'I know quite as much of him,' said Bradley, with a frown and a distant look before him, 'as I want to know.'
'Hooroar!' cried the man. 'Hooroar T'other t'other Governor.
Hooroar T'otherest Governor! I am of your way of thinkin'.'
'Don't make such a noise at this dead hour of the night. What are you talking about?'
'Look here, T'otherest Governor,' replied the man, becoming hoarsely confidential. 'The T'other Governor he's always joked his jokes agin me, owing, as I believe, to my being a honest man as gets my living by the sweat of my brow. Which he ain't, and he don't.'
'What is that to me?'
'T'otherest Governor,' returned the man in a tone of injured innocence, 'if you don't care to hear no more, don't hear no more.
You begun it. You said, and likeways showed pretty plain, as you warn't by no means friendly to him. But I don't seek to force my company nor yet my opinions on no man. I am a honest man, that's what I am. Put me in the dock anywhere--I don't care where --and I says, "My Lord, I am a honest man." Put me in the witness-box anywhere--I don't care where--and I says the same to his lordship, and I kisses the book. I don't kiss my coat-cuff; I kisses the book.'
It was not so much in deference to these strong testimonials to character, as in his restless casting about for any way or help towards the discovery on which he was concentrated, that Bradley Headstone replied: 'You needn't take offence. I didn't mean to stop you. You were too--loud in the open street; that was all.'
''Totherest Governor,' replied Mr Riderhood, mollified and mysterious, 'I know wot it is to be loud, and I know wot it is to be soft. Nat'rally I do. It would be a wonder if I did not, being by the Chris'en name of Roger, which took it arter my own father, which took it from his own father, though which of our fam'ly fust took it nat'ral I will not in any ways mislead you by undertakin' to say.
And wishing that your elth may be better than your looks, which your inside must be bad indeed if it's on the footing of your out.'
Startled by the implication that his face revealed too much of his mind, Bradley made an effort to clear his brow. It might be worth knowing what this strange man's business was with Lightwood, or Wrayburn, or both, at such an unseasonable hour. He set himself to find out, for the man might prove to be a messenger between those two.
'You call at the Temple late,' he remarked, with a lumbering show of ease.
'Wish I may die,' cried Mr Riderhood, with a hoarse laugh, 'if Iwarn't a goin' to say the self-same words to you, T'otherest Governor!'
'It chanced so with me,' said Bradley, looking disconcertedly about him.
'And it chanced so with me,' said Riderhood. 'But I don't mind telling you how. Why should I mind telling you? I'm a Deputy Lock-keeper up the river, and I was off duty yes'day, and I shall be on to-morrow.'
'Yes?'
'Yes, and I come to London to look arter my private affairs. My private affairs is to get appinted to the Lock as reg'lar keeper at fust hand, and to have the law of a busted B'low-Bridge steamer which drownded of me. I ain't a goin' to be drownded and not paid for it!'
Bradley looked at him, as though he were claiming to be a Ghost.
'The steamer,' said Mr Riderhood, obstinately, 'run me down and drownded of me. Interference on the part of other parties brought me round; but I never asked 'em to bring me round, nor yet the steamer never asked 'em to it. I mean to be paid for the life as the steamer took.'
'Was that your business at Mr Lightwood's chambers in the middle of the night?' asked Bradley, eyeing him with distrust.
'That and to get a writing to be fust-hand Lock Keeper. Arecommendation in writing being looked for, who else ought to give it to me? As I says in the letter in my daughter's hand, with my mark put to it to make it good in law, Who but you, Lawyer Lightwood, ought to hand over this here stifficate, and who but you ought to go in for damages on my account agin the Steamer? For (as I says under my mark) I have had trouble enough along of you and your friend. If you, Lawyer Lightwood, had backed me good and true, and if the T'other Governor had took me down correct (Isays under my mark), I should have been worth money at the present time, instead of having a barge-load of bad names chucked at me, and being forced to eat my words, which is a unsatisfying sort of food wotever a man's appetite! And when you mention the middle of the night, T'otherest Governor,' growled Mr Riderhood, winding up his monotonous summary of his wrongs, 'throw your eye on this here bundle under my arm, and bear in mind that I'm a walking back to my Lock, and that the Temple laid upon my line of road.'
Bradley Headstone's face had changed during this latter recital, and he had observed the speaker with a more sustained attention.
'Do you know,' said he, after a pause, during which they walked on side by side, 'that I believe I could tell you your name, if I tried?'
'Prove your opinion,' was the answer, accompanied with a stop and a stare. 'Try.'
'Your name is Riderhood.'
'I'm blest if it ain't,' returned that gentleman. 'But I don't know your'n.'
'That's quite another thing,' said Bradley. 'I never supposed you did.'
As Bradley walked on meditating, the Rogue walked on at his side muttering. The purport of the muttering was: 'that Rogue Riderhood, by George! seemed to be made public property on, now, and that every man seemed to think himself free to handle his name as if it was a Street Pump.' The purport of the meditating was: 'Here is an instrument. Can I use it?'