His mind balked at the fatal word, but, with a frown, he deliberately uttered it to himself.
“Can kill,” he said. “I’ve got to face this squarely. Other women have done things like that. A few drops of something in a glass, perhaps.”
An uncontrollable shudder ran through him.
“No!” he thought. “I needn’t think—that. I’ll wait till she’s told me. The whole thing may be—some accident—something else.”
But he remembered that she had been there alone in the housekeeper’s room, and that he had heard her crying in there. He remembered her words—“a wicked, terrible thing.” And he remembered, above everything else, her face, with that look upon it.
“Damn it!” he cried. “I won’t think at all—until I know something definite. I’ll just carry on.”
He could, and did, refuse to think of his immediate problem, but his mind would not remain idle. It presented him with a very vivid picture of Phyllis Barron. And now, for the first time, he welcomed that gentle image. She was so immeasurably remote now, so far away, in an entirely different world; a friendly, honest world, where she was living her daily life, while he stood here, watching the sun rise upon a dreaded and unpredictable day.
“Well, shover!” said Eddy’s cheerful voice behind him. “The big boss ’ll want the car for the eight forty.”
“All right!” Ross agreed, promptly. “I want a bath and a shave first. And maybe you’ll lend me a collar and a pair of socks.”
“I’ll do that for you!” said Eddy. “And say! You could try Wheeler’s uniform that he left behind. He was the shover before you. He left in a hurry. Got kicked out. Most of our shovers do.”