“Will you answer me one question, Smithers?" asked Beecham.
“If I can, yes. What is it?”
“When the accident happened were you two talking about Henning and the robbery last Christmas?”
“Yes,” he answered, “we were. I'm sorry now I had anything to do with it.”
“With what?”asked Beecham with a nervous start. Foolish fellow. He was not cool enough. The other fellow took immediate alarm.
“Oh, nothing,” and he refused to say anything more, and walked away.
“That was too bad,” said Beecham to himself, very much chagrined. “If I had been a little more diplomatic I might have wormed out of him all he knew of the matter.”
Now Jack was indeed sorely puzzled. Did Smithers mean that he was sorry that he had talked to Stockley about it, or did he mean that he was now, under the influence of a great fright, sorry that he had participated in the robbery?
Beecham sat a long time on a bench tilted against the wall, disconsolate and severely bringing himself to task.