"You?"
"Yes, I," tossing away my cigar and now fully resolved to confide in the doctor. "I think I have stumbled upon the clue you require. I will tell you how."
There was a sharp click at the gate; I closed my lips hurriedly, and we both turned to look.
'Squire Brookhouse, if possible a shade more solemn of countenance than usual, was entering the doctor's door-yard.
My host arose instantly to receive, but did not advance to meet, his latest guest.
'Squire Brookhouse accepted the chair proffered him, having first given me a nod of recognition, and, while Bethel entered the house for another chair, sat stiffly, letting his small, restless black eyes rove about, taking in his surroundings with quick, furtive glances, and I fancied that he felt a trifle annoyed at my presence.
"You seem quite serene here, in spite of yesterday's fracas," he said to me, in what he no doubt intended for the ordinary affable conversational tone.
He possessed a naturally harsh, rasping voice, not loud, but, none the less, not pleasant to the ear, and this, coupled with his staccato manner of jerking out the beginnings of his sentences, and biting off the ends of them, would have given, even to gentle words, the sound of severity.
While I replied, I was inwardly wondering what had called out this unusual visit, for I saw at once, by the look on Bethel's face, that it was unusual, and, just then, a trifle unwelcome.