“What did you say?” he asked vacantly, when the other paused.
“You look ill,” Deede Dawson answered. “Anything wrong? Why have you come back so soon? Have you failed?”
Rupert passed his hand before his eyes to clear away the mist that hung there and that hampered his sight.
He perceived that Deede Dawson held his right hand in the pocket of his coat, grasping something that bulged out curiously.
He divined that it was a pistol, and that Deede Dawson was ready to shoot at any moment, but that he wished very greatly to know first of all what had happened and why Rupert had returned so soon and whether there was immediate necessity for flight or not.
That he was uneasy was certain, for his cold eyes showed a hesitation and a doubt such as Rupert had never seen in them before.
“I'll tell you what's happened,” Rupert heard himself saying hoarsely. “If you'll tell me what's in there.”
“A bargain, eh?” Deede Dawson said. “It's easy enough. You can look for yourself if you unscrew the lid, but then, after all, why should we take all that trouble?”
As he spoke his pistol showed in his hand, and at once the heavy glass inkpot Rupert had held all this time flew straight and true, and with tremendous force, at Deede Dawson's head.
He avoided it only by the extreme rapidity with which he dropped behind the packing-case, and it flew over his head and crashed against the centre panel of a big wardrobe that stood in one corner of the room, splitting the panel it struck from top to bottom.