“I don’t ask you to take my word for it, sir,” rejoined Pickering hotly. “I have filed an inventory of the estate, so far as found, with the proper authorities.”
“Certainly. But I merely wish to be sure of my facts for the purpose of this interview, to save me the trouble of going to the records. And, moreover, I am somewhat unfamiliar with your procedure in this country. I am a member, sir, of the Irish Bar. Pardon me, but I repeat my question.”
“I have made oath—that, I trust, is sufficient even for a member of the Irish Bar.”
“Quite so, Mr. Pickering,” said Larry, nodding his head gravely.
He was not, to be sure, a presentable member of any bar, for a smudge detracted considerably from the appearance of one side of his face, his clothes were rumpled and covered with black dust, and his hands were black. But I had rarely seen him so calm. He recrossed his legs, peered into the bowl of his pipe for a moment, then asked, as quietly as though he were soliciting an opinion of the weather:
“Will you tell me, Mr. Pickering, whether you yourself are a debtor of John Marshall Glenarm’s estate?”
Pickering’s face grew white and his eyes stared, and when he tried suddenly to speak his jaw twitched. The room was so still that the breaking of a blazing log on the andirons was a pleasant relief. We stood, the three of us, with our eyes on Pickering, and in my own case I must say that my heart was pounding my ribs at an uncomfortable speed, for I knew Larry was not sparring for time.
The blood rushed into Pickering’s face and he turned toward Larry stormily.
“This is unwarrantable and infamous! My relations with Mr. Glenarm are none of your business. When you remember that after being deserted by his own flesh and blood he appealed to me, going so far as to intrust all his affairs to my care at his death, your reflection is an outrageous insult. I am not accountable to you or any one else!”
“Really, there’s a good deal in all that,” said Larry. “We don’t pretend to any judicial functions. We are perfectly willing to submit the whole business and all my client’s acts to the authorities.”