“Oh, but she said she was going to. That's one reason she made me come home ahead of time, I believe. She says she's going to see him, and what she says she'll do she generally does.”
“However I don't believe she'll see him,” went on the detective. “The prosecutor has given orders since yesterday that no one except Mr. Bartlett's legal adviser must communicate with him; so I don't believe Miss Viola will be admitted.”
This proved to be correct. Viola was very insistent, but to no avail. The warden at the jail would not admit her to the witness rooms, where Harry Bartlett paced up and down, wondering, wondering, and wondering. And much of his wonder had to do with the girl who tried so hard to see him.
She had sent word by his lawyer that she believed in his innocence and that she would do all she could for him, but he wanted more than that. He wanted to see her—to feast his hungry eyes on her—to hold her hand, to—Oh, well, what was the use? he wearily asked himself. Would the horrible tangle ever be straightened out? He shook his head and resumed his pacing of the rooms—for there were two at his disposal. He was weary to death of the dismal view to be had through the barred windows.
“Did you see him?” asked her aunt, when Viola, much dispirited, returned home.
“No, and I suppose you're glad of it!”
“I am. There's no use saying I'm not.”
“Aunt Mary, I think it's perfectly horrid of you to think, even for a moment, that Harry had anything to do with this terrible thing. He'd never dream of it, not if he had quarreled with my father a dozen times. And I don't see what they quarreled about, either. I'm sure I was with Harry a good deal of the time before the game, and I didn't hear him and my father have any words.”
“Perhaps, as it was about you, they took care you shouldn't hear.”
“Who says it was about me?”