“If you knew him well, you could make me sure. You could swear one way or another. I want to be SURE,” said Tembarom.
“So should I in your place; couldn't be too sure. Well, since you ask me, I COULD swear. I knew him well enough. He was one of my most intimate enemies. What do you say to letting me see him?”
“I would if I could,” Tembarom replied, as if thinking it over. “I would if I could.”
Palliser treated him to the far from pleasing smile again.
“But it's quite impossible at present?” he suggested. “Excitement is not good for him, and all that sort of thing. You want time to think it over.”
Tembarom's slowly uttered answer, spoken as if he were still considering the matter, was far from being the one he had expected.
“I want time; but that's not the reason you can't see him right now. You can't see him because he's not here. He's gone.”
Then it was Palliser who started, taken totally unaware in a manner which disgusted him altogether. He had to pull himself up.
“He's gone!” he repeated. “You are quicker than I thought. You've got him safely away, have you? Well, I told you a comfortable sanatorium would be a good idea.”
“Yes, you did.” T. Tembarom hesitated, seeming to be thinking it over again. “That's so.” He laid his pipe aside because it had gone out.