Hilditch laughed scornfully.
“It is all part of the great hypocrisy of society,” he proclaimed. “You have an extra glass of champagne for dinner at night and are congratulated by your friends because you have helped some poor devil to cheat the law, while all the time you know perfectly well, and so do your high-minded friends, that your whole attitude during those two hours of eloquence has been a lie. That is what first attracted me to you, Mr. Ledsam.”
“I am sorry to hear it,” Francis commented coldly. “The ethics of my profession—”
His host stopped him with a little wave of the hand.
“Spare me that,” he begged. “While we are on the subject, though, I have a question to ask you. My lawyer told me, directly after he had briefed you, that, although it would make no real difference to your pleading, it would be just as well for me to keep up my bluff of being innocent, even in private conversation with you. Why was that?”
“For the very obvious reason,” Francis told him, “that we are not all such rogues and vagabonds as you seem to think. There is more satisfaction to me, at any rate, in saving an innocent man's life than a guilty one's.”
Hilditch laughed as though amused.
“Come,” he threatened, “I am going to be ill-natured. You have shown signs of smugness, a quality which I detest. I am going to rob you of some part of your self-satisfaction. Of course I killed Jordan. I killed him in the very chair in which you are now sitting.”
There was a moment's intense silence. The woman was still fanning herself lazily. Francis leaned forward in his place.
“I do not wish to hear this!” he exclaimed harshly.