DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.22217#0080
68
THE BROKEN CAIRNGORM.
THE BROKEN CAIRNGORM.
I HAD to take Jess Murray for her share in a very bold
robbery, in which a commercial traveller, peaceably walking
home to his hotel, bad been waylaid and stripped of pocket-
book, purse, and watch, the haul altogether amounting to
upwards of ^100 in value, the greater part of which was not
his own. The gentleman could give no description of the men,
but remembered that they had been assisted at a critical
moment by a woman, who, so far as he could judge, was tall
and handsome, and not very old. It was the style of the
robbery as much as that brief and imperfect description which
directed my attention to Jess Murray. She was a bold wench,
strong as a lion,.and so thoroughly bad that I took the trouble
of hating her—an exceptional case indeed, as in general one
gets to look upon her kind with as much indifference as a
drover does upon a herd of horned knowte, under his care one
day and gone the next.
I believed Jess to be one of the few who have not one
redeeming quality or trait, and was eager for the chance which
should put her out of harm's way for a good long term of
years.
1 had really no evidence, but an instinctive feeling, con-
necting Jess with the robbery ■ but when on my way to her
place I chanced to pass one of her acquaintances on the street.
I let him pass, and then a thought struck me, and I turned
back and stopped him. A scared look at once came into his
face, so I asked him to come with me—back to the Office. He
came reluctantly, and the cause I speedily understood when he
tried to throw away behind his back a £20 bank note taken
from the pocket-book of the commercial traveller. The number
and description of this note was already in my possession, and
I picked up the paper money with the most lively satisfaction,
when the fellow immediately began to protest that he had only
been sent to change the note, and was willing to tell all about
the robbery if things were made right for himself.
THE BROKEN CAIRNGORM.
THE BROKEN CAIRNGORM.
I HAD to take Jess Murray for her share in a very bold
robbery, in which a commercial traveller, peaceably walking
home to his hotel, bad been waylaid and stripped of pocket-
book, purse, and watch, the haul altogether amounting to
upwards of ^100 in value, the greater part of which was not
his own. The gentleman could give no description of the men,
but remembered that they had been assisted at a critical
moment by a woman, who, so far as he could judge, was tall
and handsome, and not very old. It was the style of the
robbery as much as that brief and imperfect description which
directed my attention to Jess Murray. She was a bold wench,
strong as a lion,.and so thoroughly bad that I took the trouble
of hating her—an exceptional case indeed, as in general one
gets to look upon her kind with as much indifference as a
drover does upon a herd of horned knowte, under his care one
day and gone the next.
I believed Jess to be one of the few who have not one
redeeming quality or trait, and was eager for the chance which
should put her out of harm's way for a good long term of
years.
1 had really no evidence, but an instinctive feeling, con-
necting Jess with the robbery ■ but when on my way to her
place I chanced to pass one of her acquaintances on the street.
I let him pass, and then a thought struck me, and I turned
back and stopped him. A scared look at once came into his
face, so I asked him to come with me—back to the Office. He
came reluctantly, and the cause I speedily understood when he
tried to throw away behind his back a £20 bank note taken
from the pocket-book of the commercial traveller. The number
and description of this note was already in my possession, and
I picked up the paper money with the most lively satisfaction,
when the fellow immediately began to protest that he had only
been sent to change the note, and was willing to tell all about
the robbery if things were made right for himself.