“That is Mr. Clavering,” I whispered, with all the self-possession I could muster; “do you know him?”
Mr. Harwell fell back against the opposite wall. “Clavering, Clavering,” he murmured with quaking lips; then, suddenly bounding forward, clutched the railing before him, and fixing me with his eyes, from which all the stoic calmness had gone down forever in flame and frenzy, gurgled into my ear: “You want to know who the assassin of Mr. Leavenworth is, do you? Look there, then: that is the man, Clavering!” And with a leap, he bounded from my side, and, swaying like a drunken man, disappeared from my gaze in the hall above.
My first impulse was to follow him. Rushing up-stairs, I knocked at the door of his room, but no response came to my summons. I then called his name in the hall, but without avail; he was determined not to show himself. Resolved that he should not thus escape me, I returned to the library, and wrote him a short note, in which I asked for an explanation of his tremendous accusation, saying I would be in my rooms the next evening at six, when I should expect to see him. This done I descended to rejoin Mary.
But the evening was destined to be full of disappointments. She had retired to her room while I was in the library, and I lost the interview from which I expected so much. “The woman is slippery as an eel,” I inwardly commented, pacing the hall in my chagrin. “Wrapped in mystery, she expects me to feel for her the respect due to one of frank and open nature.”
I was about to leave the house, when I saw Thomas descending the stairs with a letter in his hand.
“Miss Leavenworth’s compliments, sir, and she is too fatigued to remain below this evening.”
I moved aside to read the note he handed me, feeling a little conscience-stricken as I traced the hurried, trembling handwriting through the following words:
“You ask more than I can give. Matters must be received as they are without explanation from me. It is the grief of my life to deny you; but I have no choice. God forgive us all and keep us from despair.
“M.”
And below: