60
. Lomas, sir," Reggie mumbled. "Go along with you."
"I envy your stomach," Lomas explained, put up his eyeglass and surveyed the buttered toast more closely. " O Lord! And after a bad day too! You've heard the verdict. What? Wilful murder against Cranford."
"And all is gas and gaiters. And hooroar for Scotland Yard. And you shall pay for my tea."
"It was the pistol did for him you know." Lomas smiled as a man who can afford to smile.
"'Childhood's years are passing o'er us,' Lomas," Reggie murmured. "'Soon our schooldays will be done. Cares and sorrows lie before us,' Lomas. 'Hidden dangers, snares unknown.' I've found the real pistol, old thing. Good-bye."
Lomas caught him up outside. "I say, Fortune. Without prejudice - what's your line?"
"Seek not to proticipate," Reggie smiled. "This gentleman is paying for my tea, Mary. You would be so hasty, you know."
Mr. Lomas drank whisky-and-soda.
That was the second skirmish in the Lunt case.
The general action was fought at the assizes. The interest in it began with the cross-examination of Victor Lunt. Victor Lunt, called for the prosecution, made a good impression. He looked harassed and in ill-health, affected as a good brother should be by a brother's death. But he had command of himself, proved that he had brains as well as the heart displayed by his dull eye and flabby face, he was lucid and to the point. He showed no malice against Cranford. Cranford had called on him on the morning of the murder, complained bitterly of his treatment by Sir Albert Lunt, used violent language about Sir Albert, demanded to know where Sir Albert was, and gone away. Such was Mr. Lunt's evidence in chief.
Then arose a small and pallid barrister with a priggish nose. He would ask Mr. Lunt to carry his mind back to some earlier transactions. So the story of the expedition to Mozambique was brought out and, such was the simplicity of the priggish little man, the harassed mouth of Mr. Lunt was made to explai