"Yes," was the cautious reply, given, however, with a leer he found not altogether pleasant.
"She is a relative of the injured woman, or a friend, perhaps?"
The old woman's face looked frightful.
"No," she muttered grimly; "they are strangers."
At this unexpected response Mr. Byrd made a perceptible start forward. The old woman's hand fell at once on his arm.
"Stay!" she hoarsely whispered. "By strangers I mean they don't visit each other. The town is too small for any of us to be strangers."
Mr. Byrd nodded and escaped her clutch.
"This is worth seeing through," he murmured, with the first gleam of interest he had shown in the affair. And, hurrying forward, he succeeded in following the lady into the house.
The sight he met there did not tend to allay his newborn interest. There she stood in the centre of the sitting-room, tall, resolute, and commanding, her eyes fixed on the door of the room that contained the still breathing sufferer, Mr. Orcutt's eyes fixed upon her. It seemed as if she had asked one question and been answered; there had not been time for more.
"I do not know what to say in apology for my intrusion," she remarked. "But the death, or almost the death, of a person of whom we have all heard, seems to me so terrible that——"