"I'm not so far as you are concerned, dearest," Jack, said as he kissed the girl. "I had something to do; I was working out a case that puzzled me."
"A case in some way connected with the law, I suppose?" Claire asked.
"Well, yes," Jack replied. He quite believed that the case was connected with the law. "I begin to see my way to its solution. I suppose there is not the slightest chance of your guardian coming up to-night?"
Claire replied that it did not look like it. Evidently the solution of the music problem was not an easy one, for the violin was going again as if it had only just begun.
"It makes me feel creepy," Claire exclaimed. "Fancy the idea of tracking a criminal by means of divine melody like that! Jack, don't you notice something strange about it?"
"I should say that I do," Jack said. "Why, the whole thing--really, I beg your pardon, darling. I--I was thinking about something else. It was the case I alluded to just now."
"My dear boy, you are very strange in your manner to-night," Claire said. "You look pale and distracted. Trust the eyes of love to see anything like that. You haven't bad news for me, Jack?"
Masefield forced a smile to his lips. It was hard work to maintain his ordinary manner in the face of the strange scene that he had witnessed that night.
"I have certainly heard no news since dinner time," he said. "What did you expect me to say?"
"I thought that perhaps you had mentioned me to my guardian; that you had changed your mind, and told him that you and I were going to be married some time."