But it was strange to perceive how that movement of Dunbar's had altered all the situation. Before that the three were at least the semblance of visitors demanding of their host that they should be allowed to go; now they were prisoners and knew it. Although Hesther and Harkness were still untouched they were as conscious as was Dunbar of a sudden helplessness—and of a new fear.
Harkness watched Crispin who had walked forward and now stood only a pace or two from Dunbar. Harkness saw that his excitement was almost uncontrollable. His legs, set widely apart, were quivering, his nostrils panting, his eyes quite closed so that he seemed a blind man scenting out his enemy.
"You miserable fellow," he said—and his voice was scarcely more than a whisper. "You fool—to think that you could interfere. I told you . . . I warned you . . . and now am I not justified? Yes—a thousand times. Within the next hour you shall know what pain is, and I shall watch you realise it."
Then his body trembled with a sort of passionate rhythm as though he were swaying to the run of some murmured tune. With his eyes closed and the shivering it was like the performance of some devotional rite. At least Dunbar showed no fear.
"You can do what you damn well please," he shouted. "I'm not afraid of you, mad though you are."
"Mad? Mad?" said Crispin, suddenly opening his eyes. "That depends. Yes, that depends. Is a man mad who acts at last when given a perfectly just and honourable opportunity for a pleasure from which he has restrained himself because the opportunity hitherto was not honourable? And madness? A matter of taste, my friends, decides that. I like olives—you do not. Are you therefore mad? Surely not. Be broad-minded, my friend. You have much to learn and but little time in which to learn it."
Harkness perceived that the man was savouring every moment of this situation. His anticipations of what was to come were so ardent that the present scene was coloured deep with them. He looked from one to another, tasting them, and his plans for them on his tongue. His madness—for never before had his eyes, his hands, his whole attitude of body more highly proclaimed him mad—had in it all the preoccupation with some secret life that leads to such a climax. For months, for years, grains of insanity, like coins in a miser's hoard, had been heaping up to make this grand total. And now that the moment was come he was afraid to touch the hoard lest it should melt under his fingers.
He approached Harkness.
"Mr. Harkness," he said quite gently, "believe me I am sorry to see this. You took me in last evening, you did indeed. I felt that you had a real interest in the beautiful things of art, and we had that in common. All the time you were nothing but a dirty spy—a mean and dirty spy. What right had you to interfere in the private life of a private gentleman who, twenty-four hours ago, was quite unknown to you, simply on the word of a crazy braggart boy? Have you so little to do that you must be poking your fingers into every one else's business? I liked you, Mr. Harkness. As I told you quite honestly last evening I don't know where I have met a stranger to whom I took more warmly. But you have disappointed me. You have only yourself to thank for this—only yourself to thank."
Harkness replied firmly. "Mr. Crispin, I had every right to act as I have done, and I only wish to God that it had been successful. It is true that when I came down to Cornwall yesterday I had no knowledge of you or your affairs, but, in the Treliss hotel, quite inadvertently, I overheard a conversation that showed me quite plainly that it was some one's place to interfere. What I have seen of you since that time, if you will forgive the personality, has only strengthened my conviction that interference—immediate and drastic—was most urgently necessary.