[STILL A MYSTERY]
The two men stood in silence, looking down on the wretched creature shivering in the chair. Walter Fane had never been much of a man, and now that his guilt had been brought home to him, he looked more of a craven than ever. A rat would have showed a braver front, for when in a corner that animal will fight. But Fane did not even show his teeth. He lay in the chair, huddled up, with his face covered, and moaned like a rabbit taken in a trap.
There seemed no doubt as to his guilt, and none was in the mind of the two men who had hunted him down. The evidence was without a flaw, and if Fane escaped the gallows, he so richly-deserved, it would be more a miracle than by any natural occurrence. The diary of his wife, identified him with the husband who had grown weary of her. The evidence of the key showed how she had entered the house, which had originally been furnished for her, and it only remained to learn from the lips of the assassin precisely how the crime had been committed. Fane made no attempt to defend himself. He did not even state that he had been at Westcliff-on-Sea on the night, and at the very time of the murder. He simply lay there crushed, and in spite of the horror of the cold-blooded crime he had committed, in spite of his cowardliness, the two men pitied a human being who could fall so low, and behave so basely. Even the courage of a rogue can be admired, but there was nothing worthy of admiration in the conduct of the man who had thus been caught.
Arnold spoke first, and even though he pitied in some ways the man, he could not render his voice other than cold and harsh. "Well, Fane," he said sharply, "and what is to be done?"
Fane did not reply. He only moaned. Tracey answered for him. "There's only one thing to be done, I guess," said he; "hand him over to the police. He deserves it."
The miserable man sprang to his feet with a shrill cry. "No! no! I will kill myself first. You shall not--you shall not"; and he glared at them with dishevelled hair and bloodshot eyes, his face white, his lips grey in an extremity of fear. Calvert took no notice but turned to the American.
"I am unwilling to do that," he said. "After all I am to marry Laura, and there is her sister to be considered. Should the whole truth be made public, Mrs. Fane will suffer. She is not this man's wife. I must think of her and the child, Tracey."
"That's true," assented the other, pondering. Then he looked up in a brisk manner. "I reckon the best thing is for Fane here to tell us the whole story."
"You have heard the story," moaned Fane, still hiding his shameful face.
"Not your version of it," said Tracey. "I dare say you'll try and make black appear white, and swear you didn't kill your wife."