This seemed to shock her rudely, but she quickly recovered and asked:
"Why look for a man in whom you have no interest? Has he committed some crime that you would track him down?"
"I will track that man down to his very grave," said I, solemnly, shaking my forefinger at her as she rested one hand on the foot of the bed and looked at me with breathless interest. "Miss Tescheron shall know all that I learn. If she should ever happen to call here to see you, be sure to tell her that, if you please; but you need not say I told you to tell her. Only, I shall be willing to have her know that I am on the trail of that scoundrel. There—I did not mean to burden you with my opinion of Hosley. I had intended to leave here quietly without saying a word about him. The secret has clawed at my heart so that I have not been able to keep it. And what matters it? You do not know him. I am satisfied that he has skipped to parts unknown, because he fears that officers are watching for him here. My, but it is terrible! Terrible! How can such villains achieve their dastardly ends with women and escape detection! Some mysterious influence seems to cover them, in all their devilish ways, from the suspicion of innocent people. Perhaps their victims in many cases shrink from exposing them. Oh, forgive me for burdening you with this awful mystery! It almost drives me mad!"
"Mystery! What has he done? In heaven's name, tell me!" And she almost screamed as she clenched the bed with both hands and leaned far toward me, those wonderful eyes staring in horror. The effect of my eloquence was greater than I suspected, but I continued to expand with commensurate pride.
"He murdered a woman but two days before he sought to marry Miss Tescheron"; and as I said it, I sank upon my pillow with a hand across my eyes to stay the tears which a more vivid presentation of the crimes of Hosley brought to my eyes. When I looked up, the nurse, pale but calm, was looking at me.
How wide I was of the mark! Instantly she had conceived the idea that the letter she had been reading to furnish diverting comedy in the next room was burdened with tragedy for the young woman to whom she had become deeply attached. Her training had taught her to maintain self-control in the emergency. Another woman, brought face to face with a murderer fondling his next victim with gory hands, might have swooned or excitedly rushed to the rescue of the fair prey with wild denunciations of the criminal.
"My! but you seem pale," I said anxiously.
"Your ghost story frightened me, Mr. Hopkins. Please don't tell me any more like that. It is now time for your luncheon."
There were so many things on my schedule of routine that it was always time for some cruel requirement to steal her away from me.
As she passed out I noticed a strange expression of care upon her beautiful face. I could not account for it, unless my earnestness had impressed her. Her point of view made the serious letters comedy for her at first; perhaps this was the reaction. There could be no reason for her agitation, based on her transient interest in Miss Tescheron, I imagined, for she had only met her for a few minutes at a time. It must have been my eloquence, the power of my dramatic art to so vividly portray the hideous Hosley that she became quite as much affected as if she had intimately known the criminal, and had followed his creeping, serpentine ways for bringing the next creature into his power. It rather pleased me to find that I could exercise this wonderful influence—a force so long latent in a superior intellectual equipment, obscured by a disenchanting personal appearance, especially unconvincing then, for I never looked particularly well in bed.