He brought it out at last, his hands gripping the sides of his chair, all the agonized uncertainty of the last few weeks in his voice. Olva faced him, standing above him, and looking down upon him.
"My dear Craven—what an odd question—why do you want to know?"
"Well, finding your matchbox like that—there in Sannet Wood—and I know you must have lost it just about then because I remember your looking for it here. I thought that perhaps you might have seen somebody, had some kind of suspicion. . . ."
"Well, I was, as a matter of fact, there that very afternoon. I walked through the wood with Bunker—rather late. I met no one during the whole of the time."
"No one?"
"No one."
"You have no suspicion?"
"No suspicion."
The boy relapsed from his eagerness into his heavy dreary indifference. His lips were working. Olva seemed to catch the words—"Why should it be I? Why should it be I?" Olva came over to him and placed his hand on his shoulder.
"Look here, old man, I don't know what's the matter with you, but it's plain enough that you've got this Carfax business on your nerves—drop it. It does no good—it's the worst thing in the world to brood about. Carfax is dead—if I could help you to find his murderer I would—but I can't."