"Stay here for the night," Bell growled, sotto voce. "Stay here till to-morrow morning and hear something from Van Sneck's lips that will finish his interesting career for some time. Medical treatment be hanged. A clothes-brush and some soap and water are all the physic that he requires."
Presently Henson professed himself to be better. His superficial injuries he bore with a manly fortitude quite worthy of his high reputation. He could afford to smile at them. But he feared that there was something internal of a sufficiently serious nature. Every time he moved he suffered exquisite agony. He smiled in a faint kind of way. Bell watched him as a cat watches a mouse. And he could read a deeper purpose behind that soft, caressing manner. What it was he did not know, but he meant to find out before the day was passed.
"Hadn't we better send him to the hospital?" David suggested.
"What for?" was Bell's brutal response. "There's nothing whatever the matter with the man."
"But he has every appearance of great pain."
"To you, perhaps, but not to me. The man is shamming. He has come here for some purpose, which will be pretty sure to transpire presently. The knave never dreams that we are watching him, and he hugs himself with the delusion that we take his story for gospel. Fancy a man in the state that he pretends to be in sending his card to you! Let him stay where we can keep an eye upon the chap. So long as he is under our observation he can't do any mischief outside."
There was wisdom in what Bell suggested, and David agreed. Despite his injuries, Henson made a fair tea, and his dinner, partaken of on the dining-room sofa, was an excellent one.
"And now, do not let me detain you, as you have business," he smiled. "I shall be quite comfortable here if you will place a glass of water by my side. The pain makes me thirsty. No, you need not have any further consideration for me."
He smiled with patient resignation, the smile that he had found so effective on platforms. He lay back with his eyes half closed. He seemed to be asleep.
"I fancy we can leave him now," Bell said, with deep sarcasm. "We need have no further anxiety. Perfect rest is all that he requires."