"Will you be good enough to come to the point, Mr. Smith?" she said coldly.
"Well," he said, leaning forward and speaking very deliberately, "I've come here to tell you that the police haven't quit on the job. They're about to make a worse mistake than I made."
She felt herself turn pale. It required a great effort of the will to suppress the start that might have betrayed her to the keen-eyed observer.
"That would be impossible, Mr. Smith," she said, shaking her head and smiling.
"They've been watching that Ashtley girl you sent out West just after the—er—thing happened. The show-girl, you'll remember."
He must have observed the swift look of relief that leaped into her eyes.
"What arrant stupidity," she cried, unable to choose her words. "Why, that unhappy girl is dying a slow and awful death. Surely they can't be hounding her now. Her innocence was clearly established at the time. That is why I felt it to be my duty to help her. She went out to her old home, to die or to get well. They must be fools."
"I'm just telling you, Mrs. Wrandall, that's all. Maybe you can call 'em off, if you know for a certainty that she's innocent." There was something accusing in his manner.
She became very cautious. "My opinion was formed upon the girl's story, and by what the police said after investigating it thoroughly."
"It's a way the police have, madam. They were not satisfied at the time. They simply gave her the rope, that's all. All this time they've had men watching her, day by day, out there in Montana. They say they've got new evidence, a lot of it."