"Do not thank me," answered Brett roughly. "I do not want to do it. Thank your wife."
"Oh!" exclaimed John Darche, and his eyelids contracted. "My wife! Is it for her?"
"Yes."
"I will remember that. I will remember it as long as I live."
Brett never forgot the look which accompanied the words.
"Well, be grateful to her anyhow," he said.
At that moment a piercing scream rang through the room. Marion Darche, while talking to her father-in-law, had been standing quite close to the fire. When Brett turned his head the front of her dress was burning with a slow flame and she was making desperate efforts to tear it from her.
"Good Heavens, you are really burning!" cried Brett as he crushed the flaming stuff with his bare hands, regardless of the consequences to himself.
"Did you think that I cried out in fun?" asked Marion calmly.
On hearing his wife's cry John Darche had bestowed but one glance upon her. It mattered but little to him that she was really on fire. The detectives had rushed to her assistance and for one moment no one was looking. He was close to the door. A moment later he had left the room and turned the key behind him.