“Oh, come, that’s rather too good. Ain’t I talking about the night before last, when I was going to be shot in a few hours, and you came in and turned me loose. Eh?”
“Then you are talking of what never took place. As sure as I stand here, the last time I saw you was when you were playing the fool there in front of Schoeman and the rest, simply committing suicide like the consummate ass you were, and always have been. As for turning you loose, I couldn’t have done so even if I’d wanted to. Old Schoeman took jolly good care of that by putting me under arrest myself.”
Frank stared, whistled, then shook his head.
“All I can say is then, that if it wasn’t you, it was your bally ghost. That’s all,” he said.
“Well, you’d better not talk about it any more, Frank,” said Stephanus. “Don’t you see, man? It’s a thing to forget now.”
“Oh—um—ah—of course, I see,” assented Frank readily.
“That may be, Stephanus,” said Colvin, “but I have assured the whole of this crowd upon my honour that I had no more to do with Frank’s escape than the man in the moon. And no more I had.”
“No—no—of course not, old chap,” cheerfully rejoined Frank, who didn’t believe a word of the other’s denial. “Well, after all, what’s the odds now? All’s well that ends well.”
“There’s some mystery behind all this,” said Colvin in a low tone to himself. But Aletta heard it. And then her own doubts came back to her. What if they had all been mistaken? There was evidently someone about who bore an extraordinary likeness to Colvin. Her own eyes had deceived her once. Yes, it was extraordinary.
“Mijn Baas! Mijn lieve Baas!”