"To think that such a little thing as this could kill a big man like you," muttered Mr. Hargraves, with a jerk of his head in the direction of the north lodge.
He had this pistol still in his hand when the door was suddenly opened, and Aurora Mellish stood upon the threshold.
She spoke as she opened the door, almost before she was in the room.
"John, dear," she said, "Mrs. Powell wants to know whether Colonel Maddison dines here to-day with the Lofthouses."
She drew back with a shudder that shook her from head to foot, as her eyes met the "Softy's" hated face instead of John's familiar glance.
In spite of the fatigue and agitation which she had endured within the last few days, she was not looking ill. Her eyes were unnaturally bright, and a feverish colour burned in her cheeks. Her manner, always impetuous, was restless and impatient to-day, as if her nature had been charged with a terrible amount of electricity, till she were likely at any moment to explode in some tempest of anger or woe.
"You here!" she exclaimed.
The "Softy" in his embarrassment was at a loss for an excuse for his presence. He pulled his shabby hair-skin cap off, and twisted it round and round in his great hands; but he made no other recognition of his late master's wife.
"Who sent you to this room?" asked Mrs. Mellish; "I thought you had been forbidden this place. The house at least," she added, her face crimsoning indignantly as she spoke, "although Mr. Conyers may choose to bring you to the north lodge. Who sent you here?"
"Him," answered Mr. Hargraves, doggedly, with another jerk of his head towards the trainer's abode.