For the present, I am not at liberty to mention their names. Having my own reasons for suspecting that I was on the trace of the diamond, I telegraphed to the money-lending person--
Rachel (impatiently). Do give him a name!
Cuff. All right, miss! We will give him a number, as they do in the prisons. We will call the money-lending person Number One. I telegraphed to Number One, inquiring if he had seen or heard anything of the lost Moonstone. His answer informed me that the money-borrowing person--shall we give him a number, miss? Shall we call him Number Two?
Rachel. Yes! yes!
Cuff. The answer informed me that Number Two had this very day offered your diamond as security for a loan.
Rachel (eagerly). How did he get my diamond?
Cuff. That's exactly what I want to find out!
Mr. Candy (eagerly) .You really don't know?
Cuff. I know no more than you do.
Mr. Candy. I may be able to help you.
Cuff (surprised). You, sir!
Rachel (to MR. CANDY). How can you help him?
Mr. Candy. You will hear, when I return to what I was saying, before Betteredge interrupted us. Let the Sergeant finish his story first.
Cuff. My story is done, sir. The money-lending person, otherwise Number One, received my telegram in time to stop the loan. Half-an-hour since, miss, he handed the diamond over to me in your stable-yard. (to MR. CANDY.) Now, sir, about the money-borrowing person, otherwise Number Two? How do you propose to trace the Moonstone into his hands?
Mr. Candy. Just as I proposed to find the Moonstone when I thought it was lost. Has Betteredge told you of my sleep-walking patient in the town?
Cuff. Yes, sir.
Mr. Candy. A London doctor came to consult with me on the case last night. I made the lad eat and drink (at the same hour) exactly what he eat and drank on the night when he walked in his sleep--
Rachel. And what came of it?
Mr. Candy. He never even moved in his chair. The experiment was a complete failure. I don't care--I am not satisfied yet. What fails with one patient succeeds with another. I mean to try the experiment again with Mr. Franklin Blake.
Rachel. Are you speaking seriously? Do you really believe you can make Franklin take the Moonstone in his sleep for the second time?
Mr. Candy. Do people never have the same dream for the second time? It's a common thing in everybody's experience.
Rachel. I admit that. But dreaming is not sleep-walking.
Mr. Candy. I beg your pardon--sleep-walking is simply putting a dream in action, nothing more. (He rises.) I am going to make Mr. Blake repeat the supper to which he is not accustomed, and the drink that he doesn't like, on the chance that last night's cause may once more produce last night's effect. Has his health altered in the interval? His nerves are just as irritable as ever. Does he feel no further anxiety about the diamond? He is more anxious about it than ever. And, to crown it all, he is a far more sensitive subject than my patient in the town. Is there no hope of success, with all these chances in favour?
Rachel. I can't argue with you, Mr. Candy. But I believe you will fail.
Mr. Candy. What do you say, Sergeant?
Cuff. Ditto to Miss Rachel, sir.
Mr. Candy. Public opinion! Nothing is probable unless it appeals to our own trumpery experience. I am driven to my last resources. I must refer to the only unanswerable authority--authority that is printed in a book. (He goes to the bookshelves. RACHEL and CUFF both rise.)
Rachel. What are you about?
Mr. Candy. I have borrowed books enough from this library, Miss Rachel, to know what I am about. (He takes the book which he brought with him in the Second Act, opens it, and hands it to RACHEL.) There is the famous case of the Irish porter, quoted by Mr. Combe, the great phrenologist.
Cuff. Read it out, miss, if you please.
Rachel (reading). "There was a certain Irish porter in a shop in Dublin, who was a little too fond of his native whisky. One day, he was sent to a house with a parcel. He got drunk on the way, and left his parcel at the wrong place. The next morning, when he was sober, he had no idea of where he had left it. In a day or two after, the Irish porter was drunk again. And what did he do? Went back straight to the house that he couldn't remember when he was sober, and got the parcel."
Mr. Candy (with enthusiasm). That is what I call a case in point!
Rachel (contemptuously). An Irish porter!
Mr. Candy. My confidence in the Irish porter is not to be expressed in words! What the drink did with him, I expect the supper and the glass of grog to do with Mr. Blake. I grant you it all depends on his dreaming of the diamond again. Let him only do that--and I believe he will lead us, in his sleep, straight to the person who took the Moonstone to London.
Rachel. I begin to feel interested! When may I order the supper to be sent in?
Cuff (interposing). Not in here, miss, if the doctor will allow me to interfere. (to MR. CANDY.) Let the supper be sent up to Mr. Blake in his room, by the back staircase which is used by the servants only.
Mr. Candy. You have your reasons, I suppose?
Cuff. The hall is open to everybody, sir. If you try your experiment here, suspicion may be excited in a certain quarter, which I won't particularly mention just yet. Tell me what is to be sent upstairs, and I will see that it gets to Mr. Blake without being discovered by anybody.
Mr. Candy. The game pie, Sergeant, the champagne, and the brandy-and-water. We shall see you again, I suppose?
Cuff. Certainly, sir--when I have said one more word to the policeman outside. (He goes out by the hall door. RACHEL approaches MR. CANDY in her most winning manner.)
Rachel. Dear Mr. Candy. Let me go with you when you go to Franklin!
Mr. Candy. Impossible, Miss Rachel!
Rachel. Don't be hard upon me! I am heartbroken about Franklin. Let me go with you?
Mr. Candy (taking her hand gently). I appeal to your own good sense, Miss Rachel. It is of the utmost importance to the success of our experiment that Mr. Blake's mind should be fixed on the Moonstone. By talking on that subject, and no other, we may help him to dream of it for the second time. Judge by your own feelings, how your presence would agitate him now!
Rachel. If I consent to wait, how shall I know when I may see Franklin?
Mr. Candy. I will ring the bell in Mr. Blake's bedroom. Can you hear it down here, or in your own room?
Rachel. Yes, if there is no noise at the time. (She pauses, considers a moment, and speaks to herself.) I will say something to Franklin--somehow! (She takes an ornamental drinking-glass from the curiosities placed on the cheffonier turns it till she sees a flower painted outside near the rim, kisses the rim there, and approaches MR. CANDY.) Please, Mr. Candy, let him have this glass at his supper, and turn it so that he drinks on that side, where the flower is. I hope I have not done anything that looks unladylike in your eyes. It will comfort me to think that I have given him a kiss, even in that way!
Mr. Candy (smiling). He shall take your kiss, Miss Rachel, as certainly as he takes his brandy-and-water.