“Will you tell me just what you did inside that house, and just what you saw?”
“Certainly. I was admitted, as you know, by a tall dark man who, by his dress and complexion, I should judge to be either an Arab or a North African.”
“Don’t you think it strange that no attention was paid to my first knock, and that you were admitted with as many precautions as a policeman in a thieves’ kitchen?”
“That was all explained to me by the young man himself, who seemed to be a very intelligent fellow.”
“How? What did he say?”
“He said that a lady who lodged in the house with her governess and chaperon, and who, he gave me to understand, was shortly to become his wife——”
“His wife!” interrupted Lauriston, with a rush of blood to his head.
“—had been frightened by an utter stranger who had by some means got into the house, and forcing himself into the presence of the young lady, who was asleep during the temporary absence of her companion, had woke her and caused her, in her alarmed attempt to escape, to set on fire the thin muslin wrapper she was wearing. Is not this substantially correct?” asked the doctor calmly.
“Yes; but——”
“It seemed to me quite natural that our Arabian or African friend should look upon the unexpected visit as something like an intrusion, especially as the stranger, on leaving the house, flung the aggrieved fiancé headlong over the staircase of his own dwelling.”