“I will see her if she wants to speak to me,” were his next, most unexpected words.
Mabin entered the drawing-room, and found herself face to face with the mysterious Mr. Banks.
He was standing in the middle of the long room, and as the young lady came in he held out his hand to her and offered her a seat. His hand was cold, his face looked more worn, more gray than ever, and as he moved he tottered, like a man recovering from an illness, or on the verge of one. But Mabin thought, as she looked at him, that her fancy that he must be insane was a mistaken one. It seemed to her now that there was the imprint of a great grief, an ever-present burden of melancholy, upon the grave stranger, but that his straightforward, clear eyes were the sanest she had ever seen.
“You wish to speak to me? To ask me some questions, I suppose?” he said courteously, as he leaned against the mantelpiece and bent his head to listen.
“Yes.”
Then there was a pause. It was rather a delicate matter to accuse this grave, courteous gentleman of a burglarious entry into another person’s house. Mabin had not felt the full force of this difficulty until now when she sat, breathing quickly, and wondering how to begin, while Mr. Banks still politely waited.
“I saw you just now in the garden,” she burst out at last, feeling conscious that her voice sounded coarse and harsh after his quiet tones, “and I recognized you. And I thought it was better to tell you so, to tell you that I knew it was you who—who——”
How could she go on? She didn’t. She broke down altogether, and sat looking at the gently stirring branches of the trees outside, wishing that she were under the shelter of their cool freshness, instead of going through this fiery ordeal indoors.
Then it suddenly became clear to her that Mr. Banks had been seized with a new idea.
“I suppose then,” he said, and she was delighted to see that he was at last beginning to feel some of the embarrassment which she was suffering, “that you are the lady who followed me through the drawing-room of ‘The Towers’ a fortnight ago?”