“Yes; he showed it me that same night, when I went to him after the dinner. It’s not Anne Pendennis at all.”
“But it is, man; I recognized it the moment I saw it, before he told me anything about it.”
“You recognized it!” I echoed scornfully. “We all know you can never recognize a portrait unless you see the name underneath. There was a kind of likeness. I saw it myself; but it wasn’t Anne’s portrait! Now just you tell me, right now, what you said to Southbourne. Any of this nonsense about her and Cassavetti and the red symbol?”
“No,” he answered impatiently. “I put two and two together and made that out for myself, and I’ve never mentioned it to a soul but you.”
I breathed more freely when I heard that.
“I just said when I looked at the thing: ‘Hello, that’s Anne Pendennis,’ and at that he began to question me about her, and I guessed he had some motive, so I was cautious. I only told him she was my wife’s old school friend, who had been staying with us, but that I didn’t know very much about her; she lived on the Continent with her father, and had gone back to him. You see I reckoned it was none of my business, or his, and I meant to screen the girl, for Mary’s sake, and yours. But now, this has come up; and you’re arrested for murdering Cassavetti. Upon my soul, Maurice, I believe I ought to have spoken out! And if you stand in danger.”
“Listen to me, Jim Cayley,” I said determinedly. “You will give me your word of honor that, whatever happens, you’ll never so much as mention Anne’s name, either in connection with that portrait or Cassavetti; that you’d never give any one even a hint that she might have been concerned—however innocently—in this murder.”
“But if things go against you?”
“That’s my lookout. Will you give your word—and keep it?”