The smoker responded with a contemptuous grunt; it was evident that he entertained no suspicions on that score.
"Perhaps I am unduly nervous and excited to-night," the woman went on. "But I could have almost imagined that there were spies following Anstruther to-night. If I were alone and had no more pressing thing to do, I would go back into the house and unlock that door. Imagine my feelings if I really did find two spies there."
"What confounded nonsense you are always talking!" the smoker burst out. "I suppose this comes of writing poetry. Who on earth do you suppose is in the house?"
"How can I possibly tell? The police, perhaps, or perhaps somebody who is interested in Anstruther's beautiful ward, Claire Helmsley. I am fond of Claire, and would suffer much so that she should escape injury. Really, I could make a story out of this, Richard. I would find Mr. Jack Masefield in that room, together with his friend Dick Rigby. I would whisper to them that it would be safer for them to stay where they were for the present, and that later on I would come back and release them. Oh, what nonsense I am talking, to be sure!"
The smoker affirmed this in a manner none too complimentary.
"You are without exception the wildest sentimentalist I ever came across. You are trying my patience a bit too high. Why don't you go about your business and leave me to mine?"
The woman laughed softly to herself as if she was half amused by her own secret thoughts. She did not seem to notice, or perhaps she wanted to ignore, the brutal outspokenness of her companion. For some reason or other it occurred to the listeners that she was trying to gain time. At any rate, there was no longer room for doubt that she was doing her best to warn the listeners.
"Can you make nothing of her features?" Jack asked eagerly. "My eyes are pretty keen, as a rule, but I can discern no more than the shimmering outline of her dress. If fortune is on our side presently, we must follow her and ascertain where she lives."
"That wouldn't be at all a bad move," Rigby said. "She may be a sentimentalist, and a poet into the bargain, but that does not prevent her from being an 'exceedingly clever woman. She is deceiving that bullying fellow in a way that is worthy of the best diplomatist."
"She is going to speak again," Jack whispered. "What did she say? I quite failed to get that last sentence."