"
Lionel had regained all his outward impassiveness. He stood by the
talkative woman, his arms folded. "What sort of a looking man was this
Mr. Massingbird?" he asked. "I knew a gentleman once of that name, who
went to Australia."
The woman glanced up at him, measuring his height. "I should say he was
as tall as you, sir, or close upon it, but he was broader made, and had
got a stoop in the shoulders. He was dark; had dark eyes and hair, and a
pale face. Not the clear paleness of your face, sir, but one of them
sallow faces that get darker and yellower with travelling; never red."
Every word was as fresh testimony to the suspicion that it was Frederick
Massingbird. "Had he a black mark upon his cheek?" inquired Lionel.
"Likely he might have had, sir, but I couldn't see his cheeks. He wore a
sort of fur cap with the ears tied down. My husband saw a good bit of
him on the voyage, though he was only a middle-deck passenger, and the
gentleman was a cabin. His friends have had a surprise before this," she
continued, after a pause. "He told my husband that they all supposed him
dead; had thought he had been dead these two years past and more; and he
had never sent home to contradict it.
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