“Yet that was in the afternoon, and you only come to me at this hour!” I exclaimed.
“I had something else to do first,” she said, in the same quiet voice. She was looking down now, not at me, and her eyelashes were so long that they made a shadow on her cheeks. But the blood streamed over her face.
“Even before I saw—Mr. Dundas,” she went on, “I had the idea of calling on you—about a different matter. I think it would be more honest of me, if before I go on I tell you that—quite by accident, so far as I was concerned—I was with someone who saw Mr. Dundas go to your house last night, a little after twelve. I didn’t dream of spying on—either of you. It just happened, it wouldn’t interest you to know how. Yet—I beg of you to tell me one thing. Was he with you for long—so long that he couldn’t have got to the other place in time to commit the murder?”
“He was in my house until after one,” I said boldly. “But you, if you are his friend, ought to know him well enough to be certain without such an assurance from me, that he is no murderer.”
“Oh, I am certain,” she protested. “I asked the question, not for that reason, but to know if you could really prove his innocence, if you choose. Now, I find you can. When I read the papers this afternoon, at first I wanted to rush off to the police and tell them where he had been while the murder was being committed. But I didn’t know how long he had stopped in your house, and, besides—”
“You would have dared to do that!” I broke in, the blood, angry blood, stinging my cheeks more hotly than it stung hers.
“It wasn’t a question of daring,” she answered. “I thought of him more than of you; but I thought of you, too. I knew that if I were in your place, no matter how much harm I might do to myself, I would confess that he had been in my house.”
“There are reasons why I can’t tell that he was there,” I said, trying to awe her by speaking coldly and proudly. “His visit was entirely on business. But Mr. Dundas understands why I must keep silence, and he approves. You know he has remained silent himself.”
“For your sake, because he is a gentleman—brave and chivalrous. Would you take advantage of that?”
“You take advantage of me,” I flung back at the girl, looking her up and down. “You pretend that you came from Mr. Dundas with a pressing message for me. Do you want me to believe this his message? I think too well of him.”