"That's very kindly put, sir," rejoined Luke with the semblance of a smile. "You have every right to call me a confounded blackguard."
"I shall only do that after your trial, my boy," said the other. "When I have heard you confess with your own lips that you killed that d——d scoundrel in a moment of intense provocation."
"I had better not keep the police waiting any longer, sir, had I?"
"No! no! that's all right. I'll take my poor Lou away at once, and we'll see after Edie, and Jim—we'll look after them—and Frank, too, when he comes home."
"Thank you, sir."
"S'long my boy."
And Colonel Harris—puzzled, worried, and miserable—finally went out of the room. On the threshold he turned, moved by the simple and primitive instinct of wishing to take a last look at a friend.
He saw Luke standing there in the full light of the electric lamp, calm, quite serene, correct to the last in attitude and bearing. The face was just a mask—marble-like and impassive—jealously guarding the secrets of the soul within. Just a good-looking, well-bred young Englishman in fact, who looked in his elegant attire ready to start off for some social function.
Not a single trace either on his person or in his neat, orderly surroundings of the appalling tragedy which would have broken the spirit of any human creature, less well-schooled in self-restraint.