"What do you think of it?" the detective asked Cooper.
"I'm an old friend of George," he answered. "I should advise him to clear himself at once."
It did not occur to Collins that these three men were playing the same game; that they were ranked in coalition against him. But before his mind there hovered perpetually a vague presentiment of danger, that made him mistrust his own impulse to yield to their urging.
"I can't do it!" he exclaimed despondently. "You wouldn't understand—and you wouldn't believe me."
"If your story is true it ought to be easy enough to furnish proof of it," retorted Britz.
The pitiless baiting to which Collins was being subjected was beginning to tell on him. He turned his poor, befuddled head to one side, then to the other. His eyes shot mute appeals for help, but no answering gleam of compassion came from the others. They regarded him with cold, stolid faces, expressionless as death masks.
"Why can't you leave me alone?" pleaded Collins. "I didn't kill Whitmore."
The denial was uttered in the tone of a fervent plea, but it made no visible impression on the detective.
"If you didn't do it, why don't you establish your innocence?" Britz pursued relentlessly.
"You haven't proved me guilty!" Collins fired back. Evidently something which Luckstone had told him flashed across his mind, for he seemed to come out of his bewildered state, and again he adopted an air of resolute opposition. "I won't say another word."