And that was not all.
Uncle Bond must know something, at least, about the existing crisis!
A storm of clamorous questions jostled each other in the King's brain.
How did Uncle Bond know? How long had he known? And Judith—did Judith know, too? Why had Uncle Bond chosen this particular moment, and this particular way, to reveal his knowledge? Had the little man's uncanny, unerring instinct told him that he himself was about to reveal his real identity, at last?
No. That was impossible.
Uncle Bond had marked the sentences, and placed the book on the window sill, before he himself had entered the room.
And he had had twinges of compunction, nervous tremors, about the deception which he had practised.
He laughed contemptuously at himself.
Clearly, it was he himself, and not Uncle Bond, not Judith, who had been deceived—
At that moment, Uncle Bond's returning footsteps, in the corridor, outside the room, became audible.