“You’re a good friend, Maclean. I’ll never forget how you’ve stood by me in this thing——”
“Nonsense!” he said strongly. “I was as much in it as you were—your poor wife was my patient, after all. I signed her death certificate.”
“I want to ask you a question—and I trust to you to answer it truly,” said Harry Garlett in a low, tense tone.
“Ask away, man!”
The doctor said the words jokingly, but he felt hurt and disappointed—tired, too. He had put every ounce of power he possessed—and there was a good deal of power in Jock Maclean—into the difficult interview he had just carried through so successfully.
“Did you obtain an assurance that the inquiry into the cause of Emily’s death would never be reopened?”
Harry Garlett’s question made Dr. Maclean feel acutely uncomfortable. It seemed to bring back, echoing in his ears, the last words that old friend of his, Donald Wilson, had uttered: “The matter is now closed, Maclean—unless, of course, anything in the form of real evidence be tendered us.”
So it was that for a fraction of a minute he remained silent.
“I take it they gave you no such assurance?”
“How could they do such a thing?” exclaimed the other. “Come, Harry, be reasonable!”