Guest looked at him wildly, and his lips parted, but he uttered no sound.
“Let me rest, my good fellow, let me rest. You are warring against your own happiness in trying to pry into matters that are naught to you. I will not blight your future, Percy Guest, by letting you share any secrets of mine. There, good-night. I want to be alone.”
Guest tried to recommence the argument, and to master the man who looked so pitifully weak, but somehow the other’s will was too powerful, and he had to yield, leaving the chambers at last with a shudder of horror, and feeling that he could never take Stratton by the hand again.
For the man seemed changed. There was a mocking, almost triumphant, look in his eyes as he took the lamp from the table, and followed Guest out on to the landing to stand there, holding the light over the massive balustrade for his friend to descend.
As Guest reached the bottom, he looked up, and there, by the light which fell full upon Stratton’s face, was the strange, mocking air intensified, and with a shiver he hurried across the inn, feeling that the mystery had deepened instead of being cleared.
His intention was to hurry back to his own chambers, feeling that it was impossible for him to go near Bourne Square, knowing what he did, but the yearning for one to share his knowledge proved too strong.
“And I promised that she should share every secret,” he said to himself. “Whom am I to trust if I don’t trust her!”
The result was that, with his brain in a whirl of excitement, and hardly knowing what he did, he leaped into the first cab, and urged the man to drive fast, while he sank back into the corner, and tried to make plans.
“I won’t tell her,” he decided at last. “I’ll see the admiral, and he will advise me what to do.”
He altered his mind directly. “It will be betraying poor Malcolm,” he thought; but swayed round again directly after.