That moment, however, had given Ames time to pull himself together.
Also, his insolent manner returned to him.
“I get you, Moore,” he said, with an unpleasant laugh. “We are enemies, then? So be it. You have turned me down, now I turn you down, and the thing I came to tell you, you will never know. The investigation you propose to make will be futile; the success you so confidently hope for you will never achieve.”
The man was very angry. Indeed, his rage was a revelation to me. I had not supposed him capable of such fierce passions. It flashed across my mind that a man like that could murder on a sudden provocation.
But now March took a hand.
“Mr. Ames,” the police detective said, in a quiet way, “you have said too much not to say more. Since you admitted you came here to tell something, you are obliged to tell it.”
“And if I refuse?”
“You will be called upon to tell it to the chief of police.”
“And if I still refuse?”
“I think you know for yourself the consequences of such a procedure.”