“Will you promise not to touch me if I do?”
“Yes, I’ll promise,” he replied somewhat doggedly.
For an instant more I hesitated, and then I re-entered the living-room of the mill. Mr. Norton did not offer to lay hands on me, and I set to work getting the evening meal on the table.
“Do you know this Carney?” he asked after a long spell of silence.
“I know of him,” I replied briefly.
“Who were the other two men?” he went on, pulling out his pipe and filling it.
“Strangers around here,” I said, but did not add that they were the two that had called on him during my absence.
“Were they with this Carney when he went away?”
“Yes, sir.”