In the relaxation of the strain he was conscious of fatigue for the first time. He threw himself on the sofa and in a moment had sunk into the deep deathlike sleep of exhaustion. Williams, sitting near the telephone also nodded, his big body sagged together in the chair, his chin embedded in his chest.
The group in the living-room, viewed by the uninformed spectator, might have been the usual evening gathering of an informal Gull Island house-party. They had shut the garden door against draughts and with the inland entrance open wide the place was scented with a sharp sea tang and cool with the breath of the ocean. The tide, full-brimming, lay a dark circle about them, no moonlit path or silvered eddies to-night, the channel a solid swath of black between them and the clustering shore lights.
They made a deceptively quiet picture, pleasant, agreeable-looking people resting in reposeful attitudes after a day in the open air. Shine was looking at a book of engravings spread on the end of the table. Mrs. Cornell had brought in Miss Pinkney after the business of washing up—Mrs. Cornell found Miss Pinkney’s society so fortifying that she sought it at all hours—and together they made a feint of playing a double solitaire. Anne and Flora sat near by reclining in armchairs, both silent, with the fixed eyes of preoccupation. Stokes was the sole member of the company whose inner unrest broke out in movement. He paced back and forth before the fireplace, quick long strides over the bear rug to the hall door and back again. Once or twice the edge of the rug caught his toe and he kicked it out of his way with a violent angry jerk of his foot.
When the minutes ticked away and no one came to overlook or overhear, a cautious trickle of talk began to flow. Question and answer crossed, low-toned, interrupted by warning looks at the hall door. Where had Rawson gone, what could he be after? That the question lay uppermost in all their minds was shown by the quick response to the first, murmured tentative, the comprehension of sentences left unfinished with only the query in the eyes to point their meaning. The drooping attitudes gave place to a tense eagerness of pose, heads thrust forward on craned necks. Shine forgot his book, the cards lay scattered beneath the hands of Mrs. Cornell and Miss Pinkney, and Flora edged her chair closer. Their voices, hushed by fears, were fused in a murmurous hum, rising as the subject swept their interest higher, checked in sudden minutes of listening alarm.
Rawson must have got hold of some information, gone afield on a new clue. Then followed speculations, surmises, suggestions—wild, fantastic, probable. It might have been nothing Shine thought, simply a trip to the county-seat on business connected with the case. At this Anne crept into the circle of lamplight, nodding an avid agreement. Stokes coming forward caught his foot in the edge of the bear rug, stumbled and broke into a stream of curses. Miss Pinkney, who thought oaths anywhere reprehensible and on Gull Island profanation, grimly bade him lift his feet. He glared at her, more curses imminent, and Flora groaned, clutching the arms of her chair and rolling her eyes upward.
“For God’s sake don’t mind anything anybody says,” implored Mrs. Cornell slapping her hands down among the cards. “This is a murder case, not a social function.”
They calmed down and presently, with no more ideas to exchange, grew silent listening for the returning launch. It was a listening so wrapt that the room became as still as a picture and they as motionless as pictured figures. The ticking of the clock was audible, the sucking clinking sounds of the water along the shore. The significance of what they awaited grew with the minutes till the coming of the launch seemed an event of fearful import upon which their fates hung.
The entrance of Williams shook them from their terrors. If his face told them nothing, his manner was kindly gruff—they must be tired, best thing for them to go to bed. As they rose and trailed limply to the doors he beckoned Shine to remain. He would want him later, had a job for him, so he’d better go now and get some sleep. His room was on that floor, the butler’s? All right, he’d find him. Shine departed, grateful. He was half-dead with sleep, but had kept it hidden as he had his hunger, regarding both as unmanly weaknesses in the hour of calamity.
Williams went back to the library where Bassett still slept. He looked at his watch—a quarter to nine. He couldn’t understand it—what could Rawson have got hold of on the mainland when it was as plain as printing Mrs. Stokes was the guilty party. He started and moved to the window; the throbbing beat of an engine came through the silence, a low spark of light was advancing from the opposite shore.
When he heard the boat grinding against the wharf he waked Bassett.