"Where did you see Mrs. Delane?"
"Once at her own place. I was delivering some poultry food that Delane had bought of my employer—and once at a place belongin' to a man called Tanner."
"Tanner?"
"Tanner. He was somethin' the same sort as Delane. We've a lot of them in Canada—remittance men, we call them—men as can't get on in the old country—and their relations pay 'em to go—and pay 'em to keep away. But Tanner was a nice sort of fellow—quite different from Delane. He painted pictures. I remember his showin' some o' them in Winnipeg. But he was always down on his luck. He couldn't make any money, and he couldn't keep it."
"You saw Miss Henderson there?"
Dempsey gave a guffaw.
"Oh, Lor, no! I don't say that. Why, I'd get into trouble—shouldn't I? But I saw Mrs. Delane. I was driving past Tanner's place, with two horses, and a heavy load, November two years ago—just before we passed our Military Service Act, and I joined up. And an awful storm came on—a regular blizzard. Before I got to Tanner's I was nearly wore out, an' the horses, too. So I stopped to ask for a hot drink or somethin'. You couldn't see the horses' heads for the snow. And Tanner brought me out some hot coffee—I'm a teetotaller, you see—an' a woman stood at the door, and handed it to him. She was holdin' a lamp, so I saw her quite plain. And I knew her at once, though she was only there a minute. It was Mrs. Roger Delane."
He stopped to light a cigarette. No sound came from his companion. All round them spread the great common, with its old thorns, its clumps of fir, its hollows and girdling woods, faintly lit by a ghostly moonlight that was just beginning to penetrate the misty November dusk. The cheerful light of Dempsey's cigarette shone a moment in the gloom. Delane was conscious of an excitement which it took all his will to master. But he spoke carelessly.
"And what was Mrs. Delane doing there?"
Dempsey chuckled.