"Tell me what happened," he commanded.
Arnold made a movement as though he would have spoken, but Wolff stopped him with a courteous but decided gesture.
"I wish Miles to tell me—if he can," he said.
Miles lifted his hanging head. A silly self-satisfaction twisted his unsteady lips.
"I can tell you right enough," he said, "only I'll sit down, if you don't mind, I feel so infernally shaky. It was Bauer, you know. I was having my supper when I heard him and another fellow talking, and though I'm not good at the jargon I caught the drift of what he was saying. It was about a woman. He said if he were her husband he would make an end of such a dirty scandal, and put a bullet through some one or other's head. You can fancy that I pricked up my ears, and I turned and saw that he was pointing at Nora and Arnold. That was too much for me. I got up and asked what he meant. He told me—and I swear it wasn't nice. He said——"
Wolff lifted his hand.
"I don't want to hear that," he said. "Go on."
"Well, I knocked him down, and there was the devil of a row!" Miles laughed unsteadily. "The silly fools wanted me to fight a duel over it!" he added.
"And you——?"
"I told them I wasn't going to make such a d——d idiot of myself."