But I was stupefied to see the second man who rose and advanced toward me with a shrewd smile. For it was Tom Carson!
Presently I was telling my story—except for that part which more intimately concerned myself and Jacqueline, and the narrative of the murder, which I gave only as Lacroix had confessed it to me.
A look of incredulity deepened on Tom's shrewd old face till, at the end, he burst out explosively at me:
"Hewlett, I didn't think I was a damned fool before—I beg your pardon, miss. If any man had told me that I would have knocked him down. But I am, I am, and want you to be my manager."
"Do you mean that I have lied to you?" I asked indignantly.
"Every word, Hewlett—every word, my son. That is why I want you back with me. First you leave my employment without offering any reason; then you take hold of my business affairs and try to pull off a deal over my head, and then you tell me a yarn about a castle falling into a lake."
"But, M. Carson," interposed the priest, "I myself have seen this château many times. And I have gone to the entrance and looked from the mountain, too, and it is no longer there."
"Never was," said Carson. "You fellows get so lonesome up in these wilds that you have to see things."
"But I heard the explosion."
"Artillery practice down the Gulf."