As it was therefore unnecessary to pursue the subject, and as already Horace was asking him mutely why he should take such an interest in an engaged young lady, Prelice changed the subject by an attack on the doctor himself. "I can't understand why you should wish to abandon the search into these cases when you were so keen yesterday to run the show on your own."
Horace quite understood the slang of the concluding remark. "I merely quoted a proverb about letting sleeping dogs lie," he said coolly.
"Why? Are you afraid for a certain person?" questioned Prelice, meaning Agstone and the listener's relationship with Agstone.
"Oh no," retorted the doctor, quite aware of what Prelice was referring to. "The person you hint at is dead, and everyone believes him guilty of the first murder. It doesn't matter who killed him, as Shepworth here is sure to be acquitted. I don't care a damn one way or the other, as you will respect my confidence."
"What confidence?" asked the barrister suddenly.
"One that I made to Prelice here," said the doctor dryly; then heaving up his squat figure from the armchair, he waddled towards the door. There he paused, and addressed himself to Prelice: "If you go on prying into this matter," he said, with uplifted finger, "you will be very, very sorry, my son."
"What do you mean?"
"Gammon and spinach," said Horace, again enigmatic, and hurled himself out of the room, still smoking his unwieldy pipe. The two young men stared at one another.
"Is he mad?" asked Shepworth.
"Mad like Hamlet, south-sou'west," rejoined the other in a vexed tone; "unless he is in league with that Jadby bounder, whom he knew in the South Seas, I don't know what he means by backing out."