Out in the hall Shattuck was still at the telephone and we could just make out that he was talking in a very low tone, inaudible to us at a distance. I wondered with whom it might be. From his manner, which was about all we could observe, I gathered that it was a lady with whom he talked. Few of us ever get over the feeling that in some way we are in the presence of the person on the other end of the wire. Could it have been with Honora Wilford herself that he was talking?
A few moments later Shattuck returned from the telephone.
"Have you met Mrs. Wilford recently?" asked Kennedy, picking up the conversation where he had been interrupted by the call.
Shattuck eyed Kennedy with hostility and grunted a surly negative. I felt that it was a lie.
"I suppose you know that she has been suffering from nervous trouble for some time?" he continued, calmly ignoring Shattuck's answer, then adding, sarcastically, "I trust you won't consider it an impertinence, Mr. Shattuck, if I ask you whether you were aware that Doctor Lathrop was Mrs. Wilford's physician?"
"Yes, I am aware of it," returned Shattuck. "What of it?"
"He is yours, too, is he not?" asked Kennedy, pointedly.
Shattuck was plainly nettled by the question, especially as he could not seem to follow whither Kennedy was drifting.
"He was once," he answered, testily. "But I gave him up."
"You gave him up?"