She said no word, but the pressure of her hand on mine told me more than hours of speech.
Chapter VI.
I TELL A LIE.
The police had brought the divisional surgeon with them, and he made his brief examination while the sergeant questioned Moira and myself. My story was the simple one that I had outlined, and I must say that Moira played up well to my lead. She was naturally upset at what she had gone through, and the sergeant, I fancy, made allowance for this, and attributed any trifling discrepancies between our two stories to this fact. He was one of the politest officials it has ever been my lot to deal with, and he carried out his duties in a way that made me his debtor for life. I was not as shocked by the occurrence as I might have been. I had seen far too much of the rough side of life and the sudden side of death to have any other feeling than a rather natural sorrow at losing a man who had been something more than a benefactor to me; but I did not make the radical mistake of treating Bryce's death too lightly. I rather flatter myself that I mixed my sorrow and my common sense in just the right proportions. It was different with Moira; she was genuinely distressed, and made no effort to conceal it. It was the first time for many years that I had seen her so unaffected, and natural, and I must say that the sight brought out all that was best in me.
The sergeant took our names and then began a close personal questioning. He enquired into my past life, asked me how long I had been with Bryce, and then bluntly demanded to know in what capacity I was staying in the house.
"Mr. Bryce," I said, "was an old friend of my father's, and naturally there was always a welcome here for me."
I picked my words carefully, because I was in mortal dread that some stray remark might put him on to that affair on the beach. I knew that if he once got wind of that everything was up with us, and our hastily-built castle of cards would come tumbling to the ground. While I was thinking of this it struck me all of a heap that there was a chance of something leaking out about the burglar of the other day. The only thing I could see was to make a clean breast of it.
"I don't know whether this has got anything to do with the burglary the other night," I said casually.
"What's that?" the sergeant demanded.