“He is about the house somewhere, I expect,” said Freda yearningly. “I saw the empty coffin,” she continued, in a whisper of suppressed horror, “not more than half an hour after they had all gone, so I am sure he cannot have got far. He is in hiding somewhere about. Oh, Crispin, Crispin, you are in all the secret, you were the chief witness, you helped in it all, you do know. Tell me, tell me where he is. Is he going away? Can’t I see him, just for one moment. I would not say one word.”
She seemed to be moving him: as she clung about him, he turned away his head uneasily. She continued her pleading, more and more earnestly, more and more passionately, until at last he burst out: “He was a bad man. You’d better forget him.”
“How can he be so bad when you and your wife take all sorts of risks to shield him?”
“It’s to our interest.”
“I believe you’re a better man than you pretend, Crispin,” said Freda after a pause.
“Perhaps so. Here’s your tea,” he answered laconically, as Mrs. Bean, tray in hand, entered the room.
CHAPTER XIV.
The funeral was to take place on the following day. It was not without a shudder that Freda made her way up to her bedroom that night, although she had taken the precaution of insisting that Mrs. Bean should accompany her to the very door. Even then she was reluctant to let the housekeeper go.
“Mrs. Bean,” she said in a whisper, as she clung to the housekeeper’s rough arms after bidding her good-night. “What room is there under this one?”
The housekeeper looked rather uneasy, and laughed.