“In fact,” said Captain Chase darkly, “I shouldn’t faint with surprise if he felt sorry for himself.”
“Why?”
“Well, you don’t think I’m going to pass this over, do you? D’you think I’m going to have my wife hugged an’ kissed in broad—broad lamp-light——”
“In her own coupé, at her own request.”
“Never,” shouted Roger. “He was assaulting her.”
“Then why,” said Virginia swiftly, “why didn’t you stop the car?” Captain Chase started. “I thought men fell over themselves to rescue, er, virtue in distress. Oh, and when you tackle Derry, supposing he denies it, what are you going to say?”
“I shall say I saw him.”
“Where from? The interior of his own car . . . which you were sharing with his wife . . . at one o’clock in the morning . . . five miles from Berkeley Square?”
The sudden perception that his guns were spiked seemed to deprive Captain Chase of the power of utterance.
At the third attempt—