A faint light crept into Violet Wayne’s eyes, and Tony knew he had gone far enough.
“The one thing I resent is that it apparently sets you thinking,” she said. “I can’t be satisfied with less than I offer you, Tony, and the man who loves me must believe in me implicitly. I did not get angry when you would not share your troubles with me.”
Tony softened. “I’m sorry, Violet, but the fact is I don’t feel very pleased about anything to-night. Nobody could expect it!”
“Is it Davidson’s death that is troubling you?”
She looked at him with a curious intentness, for Tony’s face was haggard, and a horrible fear came upon the man as she did so. Her gaze disconcerted him, and he fancied he saw suspicion in it. Accordingly he clutched at the first excuse that presented itself.
“Not altogether! It’s Bernard,” he said.
Another irretrievable step was taken. Tony had waited as usual for events, instead of choosing a path to be adhered to in spite of them. As the result he was forced into one by which he had not meant to go, and it led rapidly down hill. Violet Wayne, however, straightened herself a trifle in her chair.
“Tony,” she said, “it is quite impossible that you should think what your words suggest.”
The man’s face flushed, for her quiet assurance stirred the bitterness of jealousy that had hitherto lain dormant in him, and again he answered without reflection, eager only to justify himself.
“When a man borrows money, and goes out at night to meet another who may have been blackmailing him, and then disappears when that man is found dead with marks of violence on him, what would anybody think?” he said.