"They couldn't understand why you were playing Hastings' game," she proceeded, "playing it to his smallest instructions."
"Hastings' game! What the thunder are they talking about? What do they mean, his game?"
"His desire to keep suspicion away from the Sloanes and Mr. Webster. That's what they hired him for—isn't it?"
"I guess it is—by gravy!" Mr. Crown's long-drawn sigh was distinctly tremulous.
"That old man pockets his fee when he throws Gene Russell into jail. Why, then, isn't it his game to convince you of Gene's guilt? Why isn't it his game to persuade you of my secret knowledge of Gene's guilt? Why——"
"So, that's——"
"Let me say what I started," she in turn interrupted him. "As one of the reporters pointed out, why isn't it his game to try to make a fool of you?"
The smile with which she recommended that rumour to his attention incensed him further. It patronized him. It said, as openly as if she had spoken the words: "I'm really very sorry for you."
He dropped his hands to his widespread knees, slid forward to the edge of his chair, thrust his face closer to hers, peered into her hard face for her meaning.
"Making a fool of me, is he?" he said in the brutal key of unrepressed rage.