The silence was broken by Genevieve abruptly rising.
"I must really go," she announced, hurriedly. She was the least bit flurried, and there was a wonderful soft light in the handsome eyes that had not been there when she came. As she passed me she lightly brushed my shoulder with the gloved tips of one hand.
"I am no longer cast-down," I heard her murmur; "I know you will do—what is right."
I caught the fingers, detaining her.
"Don't go—not yet."
She lingered, expectant and more cheerful.
"I can't let you go like this"—I was steady enough now. She moved again to the chair she had just vacated, and I released the slim, soft fingers.
"There is one thing we haven't considered," I pursued, "and that is Mr. Alexander Burke. You say Mr. Fluette despises him: if he does, it is not without warrant, I 'd be willing to swear. What that fellow's game is I can't just at this time conceive, but I 'm confident that he 's playing one of some kind—a deep one, too. If he is, the potentialities are endless with such a cunning, unscrupulous rascal.
"I 'm satisfied, moreover, that he has lied to me. According to his statement, no one was in this house last night besides himself, Mr. Page, and Royal Maillot. Between him and Maillot I give the latter the preference, for, if the stories of both are true on any one point, it is that Burke was up and about before and during the time the murder was committed. Burke is consequently in the best position to know who was or was not in the house.
"Now I have a particular reason for thinking that this is one phase of the matter about which he has lied. Should it be that some one else was here—some one that we know nothing about—why, that would put an entirely different complexion upon the affair."