He stood perplexed, eyeing me with mingled doubt and astonishment; then, turning with an inexpressible look of longing towards the one object of his care, he cried:
"You do not understand or you would not ask me to leave her, not for a moment. I have not had her so near me, so near my hand, so near my heart, these many minutes in years. She cannot rise and run away from me now. She does not even wish to. This is a happiness to me you cannot appreciate, a happiness I cannot endure seeing cut short. Leave me, then, I pray, and come again when she has been laid in her grave. You will find me ready to receive you, ready to explain——"
"You ask the impossible," interrupted Mr. Gryce. "Some explanations will not bide the convenience of even so recent a mourner as yourself. If you do not wish to be taken immediately from this place, you will make some few things clear to us. What has this woman had to do with your father's death?"
"Nothing."
The fire with which Leighton Gillespie uttered this word made us both start. Aghast at what struck me as a direct falsehood, I instinctively opened my lips. But Mr. Gryce made me an imperceptible gesture, and I refrained from carrying out my inconsiderate impulse.
"I see," continued the unhappy man, "that suspicions which I had supposed confined to my brothers and myself have involved my innocent wife. This is more than I can bear. I will at once make known to you my miserable story."
Mr. Gryce drew up a chair and sat down. As there was no other in the room we knew what that meant. The damp air was beginning to tell upon the rheumatic old man. Attention being thus called to the open window, Sweetwater moved over and closed it. Never shall I forget the look which Leighton Gillespie cast towards the bed as that broken and ill-fitting sash came rattling down.
"See if the hall is clear," said Mr. Gryce.
The young detective crossed to the door. As he opened it and looked out, a gust of noisy laughter rose from below, mingled with the shrill sound of a woman's singing, the same, doubtless, which we had previously heard in front. These tones, heard amid brawl and shouting, seemed to pierce Mr. Gillespie to the heart. Mr. Gryce, who saw everything, motioned to Sweetwater to close the door as he had the window. Sweetwater complied by shutting himself out. This was an act of self-denial which I felt called upon to emulate.
"Shall I join Mr. Sweetwater?" I asked.