“Oh!” she said. “They mustn’t—”
“Don’t you worry,” he reassured her. “I think I can safely promise you they won’t do what you expect them to.”
“You mean,” joyously, “you have a way to circumvent them?” She was sure now he had; the aristocratic burglars always have. He would probably have a long and varied career before him yet.
“I mean just what I say. But I think they want to talk with me? Indeed, I’m quite sure they do. They are coming up now. Perhaps you’d better leave me to deal with them.”
“You—you are sure they have no evidence to—?”
“Land me in jail? Positively. I assure you, on my honor, you are the only living person who, by any stretch of the imagination, could offer damaging testimony against me, along that line.”
He spoke so confidently she felt it was the truth. “I believe you,” she said. She wanted to say more, befitting the thrill of the moment, but she had no time. Dickie and two others were approaching. It might be best if he met them alone. So she slipped away and walked toward the house. It would be quite exciting enough afterward, she told herself, to find out what happened. It wasn’t until she got almost to the house, that she remembered she ought to have asked Bob for a ring. Of course, he would have a goodly supply of them. Would it make her particeps criminis though, if she wore one of his rings? Then she concluded it wouldn’t, because she was innocent of intention. She didn’t know. She wondered, also, if she should announce her “engagement” right off, or wait a day or two. She decided to wait a day or two. But she told Miss Gwendoline Gerald what a lovely time she and Mr. Bennett had had together, fishing. And Miss Gerald smiled a cryptic smile.
Meanwhile Bob had met Dan and Dickie and Clarence.
CHAPTER XII—JUST ONE THING AFTER ANOTHER
It was far from a pleasant meeting. Dickie looked about as amiable as a wind or thunder demon, in front of a Japanese temple. That oscillatory performance beneath the “kissing-oak,” as the noble tree was called, had been almost too much for Dickie. He seemed to have trouble in articulating.