At this she sprang up, her hands outstretched appealingly; the fear now plain in her face.
"No, no!" she cried. "He is not guilty! He did not do it!"
"My dear young lady," said Ashton-Kirk, soothingly, "control yourself. Don't forget that before this thing is ended you will probably need all the self-command you can summon." Then as she resumed her seat, he added: "I did not say that he was guilty. I was merely telling you of the formless thought that you had in mind when you turned out the light."
She sat staring at him, the horror of it all still in her eyes. Then she nodded her head slowly, and said in a husky voice.
"Yes; that is what I thought, and that is why I called you on the telephone. I thought you would pity me and show me some way of covering it all up. But after I had your promise to come, I was seized with the fear that you might—that you might betray him. That is, I suppose, the real reason why I tried to deceive you. In my terror I myself thought Allan guilty. But, of course, now that I have had time to calmly think it over, I know he was not—that he couldn't be! No one who knows him will believe he did it."
"What reason had you for thinking that he might be guilty?"
"His manner during the afternoon before the murder. He seemed so fiercely resolved, so different from his usual self."
"I understand. And what makes you think now that he is innocent?"
"I believe it because I understand his nature," said Miss Vale, earnestly. "He might be finally aroused—under provocation he might even be violent. But he could never do a thing like this—it is too utterly horrible."
"You have judged that it was probably he who was seen to go into Hume's before the murder?"