'No good will come of this,' she cried.
Her face was distraught in the moonlight and her breath came in sobs. I left her there, with her great eyes watching me in despair, and went down the dark corridor. It was dank and chill, like the galleries of the mine. My wet clothes clung to me and my boots squelched on the stone flags. There was a light shining under the door of the old man's study. I turned the handle and pushed the door open.
The old man was sitting at his desk. He looked up and when he saw me standing there in the doorway all dripping from the mine, he started to his feet, the lamplight shining on his pale eyes.
For a moment we stood there, staring at each other. I don't know whether he thought me a ghost or was just too startled to speak. Whatever it was, he just stared at me with his mouth opened like a cavity in his head. I turned and shut the door. Then I started towards him. And at the same moment he made a dive for a little iron pick-axe that stood on a shelf among some relics of early mining.
I reached him as his hand closed on the deadly weapon. He fought me off with a strength that was incredible in a man of his age. But I was stronger than he was. I twisted the pick from his grasp and flung him back. He fetched up against his desk, overturning the big swivel chair with a crash.
He was frightened now. I could see it in his eyes. His tongue showed through his beard as he licked his lips. He was breathing heavily. 'What do you want?' he asked. 'If it's about your mother, you know all there is to know. She was mad.'
I felt an itch to get my thumbs into the grey stubble of his neck. 'I'm not sure it isn't you who are mad,' I said, keeping a hold on my anger. His eyes stared at me. They didn't blink. It was as though they had no lids to them. And they were pale — paler than I'd ever seen a man's eyes. I said, 'You thought I wouldn't get out of those old workings, didn't you? You thought I'd die, trapped down there beyond that stoping. You wanted me to die.'
His hands had tightened on the edge of the desk. 'I don't know what you're talking about.' He made an attempt at aloofness, but his voice trembled.
'Yes, you do,' I said. 'You knew I was following you. You deliberately led me into the old part of the mine. And then you went back and knocked those staples out.'
'How was I to know you were following me?' he asked.