As there was (unless we call Garibaldi
Italian, which he obviously was not) nary a subject of King Ponzi or
Carruso or whatever be his name residing at La Ferte Mace, Garibaldi was
in the habit of expressing himself--chiefly at the card table, be it
said--in a curious language which might have been mistaken for French. To
B. and me he spoke an equally curious language, but a perfectly
recognizable one, i.e., Cockney Whitechapel English. He showed us a
perfectly authentic mission-card which certified that his family had
received a pittance from some charitable organisation situated in the
Whitechapel neighbourhood, and that, moreover, they were in the habit of
receiving this pittance; and that, finally, their claim to such pittance
was amply justified by the poverty of their circumstances. Beyond this
valuable certificate, Garibaldi (which everyone called him) attained
great incoherence. He had been wronged. He was always being
misunderstood. His life had been a series of mysterious tribulations. I
for one have the merest idea that Garibaldi was arrested for the theft of
some peculiarly worthless trifle, and sent to the Limbo of La Ferte as a
penance. This merest idea is suggested by something which happened when
The Clever Man instituted a search for his missing knife--but I must
introduce The Clever Man to my reader before describing that rather
beguiling incident.
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