The Charing Cross Mystery quotes

Now

Hetherwick was a young barrister, going in for criminal practice, in whom the observant faculty was deeply implanted; it was natural to him to watch and to speculate on anything he saw.

Because of this, and perhaps because he had just then nothing else to think about, he sat observing the newcomers;

“Lord bless you!” he said. “

It’s like seeking a needle in a bundle of hay, searching for a given man in London!

I mean, of course, sometimes. More often than not, in fact. Here’s this chap rushes up the stairs at Charing Cross, vanishes—where? One man amongst seven millions of men and women! However—”

“For a lady—aye!” replied Hudson, with a grim laugh. “

Her arm was tattooed! Right round the place where she always wore this black velvet band there was a snake, red and green, and yellow, and blue, with its tail in its mouth!

—wonderfully done, too; it had been no novice that had done that bit of work, I can tell you!

“

Aye, but in my experience, Mr. Hetherwick, it’s the impossible that happens!

” rejoined Matherfield. “In a beehive like this, where every man’s intent on his own business, ninety-nine men out of a hundred never observe anything unless it’s shoved right under their very eyes.

“

A murder, a suicide, or a sudden death is as a breath of heaven to these folk!

” said Matherfield as they made their way through the ragged and frowsy gathering. “It’s an event in uneventful lives. Here’s the place,” he added, as they came to a doorway whereat a policeman stood on guard.

“

Dancing! Drinking! Devilry! Quite respectable, though,

” replied Mapperley. “Been no prosecutions, anyway—so far.”

“That would be a tall order, mister!” he answered. “There’s a few thousand of people packed into this bit of London. Of course, I do know a good many, close at hand. But if you’re a Londoner you’ll know that

Londoners keep themselves to themselves.

May seem queer, but it’s a fact that I don’t know the names of my next-door neighbours on either side—though to be sure they’ve only been here a few years in either case.”