“I understand, and you are quite right,” murmured Pauline, her manner quiet, her tone even, but in the dark eyes raised to his Fleming Stone saw fear,—definite, unmistakable fear.
“Then explain, for I am sure you can, why you suppressed the fact of your own purchase of that paper snake until forced to admit it.”
“I was afraid.” The beautiful face was of a creamy pallor and the scarlet lips quivered. But this evident agitation on Miss Stuart’s part did not deter Stone from his probing queries.
“Why were you afraid? Afraid of what?”
“Afraid that if you knew I bought the snake you would think I was in some way connected with—with the crime——”
“But don’t you see that to attempt to conceal the fact of your purchase makes any such suspicion more imminent?”
“You don’t think I would—would——”
“I don’t want to think anything about it, Miss Stuart. I want to know, and I want you to tell me all about your aunt’s strange request for you to buy a thing she so feared and abhorred.”
“I don’t understand it myself. But Aunt Lucy was full of vagaries and would often ask me to buy strange or outlandish things for her.”
“But not of a reptilian nature?”