“Toward finding the murderer? Why, no; I had not thought of doing so.”
“But of course you will. You won’t allow the affair to rest in statu quo?”
“Why not?”
“Why, considering your relations to Miss Pathzuol, I should think your motive would be plain. Don’t you want to see her murderer punished, her death atoned for?”
“Her death atoned for! Her death can never be atoned for. And the punishment of her murderer—would that restore her to me? Would that undo the fact that she is dead? Else, why should I bestir myself about it?”
“Common human nature ought to be enough; the natural wish to square accounts with him.”
“Do you fancy, Epstein, that such an account as this can be squared? Suppose we had him here now at our mercy, what could we do by way of squaring accounts? Put him to death? Would that square the account? To say so would be to compare his miserable life to hers.—But besides, he is not at our mercy. We have no clew to him.”
“Yes, on the contrary, we have.”
“Indeed? What is it?”
“Why, the most apparent one. You are sure the Marshalls lied?”