He held out his hand and she gave him the wallet without a word.
"Sit down," he said kindly.
He thought she was going to faint.
"I hope I didn't hurt you? I hadn't the slightest idea——"
She shook her head.
"Oh, I'm not hurt," she said wearily, "not hurt in the way you mean."
She drew a chair to the table and dropped her face upon her hands and he stood by, embarrassed, almost terrified, by this unexpected development.
"So you were the visitor on the bicycle," he said at last. "I didn't suspect——"
It struck him at that moment that it was not an offence for Odette Rider to go up to her mother's house on a bicycle, or even to take away a wallet which was probably hers. If there was any crime at all, he had committed it in retaining something to which he had no right. She looked up at his words.
"I? On the bicycle?" she asked. "No, it was not I."