"I thought I had explained all that last night."
"It must have been over when I was with you in the West."
"It wasn't."
"Not when you were the first man to volunteer to go down in the shaft of 'Better Days' mine after the explosion?"
"I have rarely been more afraid than I was then."
"Or when you played head-nurse in the spotted-fever mess at Sunnyside?"
"I was nearly sick—scared sick—myself."
Holt's patent-leather boots flashed in and out of the shadow cast by the table-edge.
"Hum," he said. "It don't seem to show a healthy state of mind, does it?"
Stainton had disappeared into his bedroom. From there his answer came, partly muffled by the half-closed door.