"In every sense--every sense! Do you think--that while he's being buried--I should be here--if I had known that he was murdered? He was my father."
"In any case he was that."
"Not in any case, not in any case! I may have got him all wrong! I may have misjudged! I may--I don't know what I mayn't have done. There's the letter!"
"What letter?"
"To Mr. Wilkes. You said, when he wrote it, he was mad, and that taking his own life proved it. I thought so. But, if he didn't take his own life, what then?" Rodney made an effort to regain his self-possession, and partially succeeded.
"My dear Gladys, the whole business is a bad one, whichever way you look at it. We are to be married on Monday."
"Monday? Married--to you?"
The knowledge of women on which he was apt to pride himself ought to have warned him that this was not the same girl as the one with whom he had come back from lunch in the cab. But at the moment he was not yet quite himself; his perception was at fault. He made a mistake.
"My dear Gladys, you are perfectly well aware that the arrangement, as it stands at present, is that we are to be married on Monday. I was merely about to suggest that, as it would seem that this whole unfortunate affair is likely to prove too much, we should be married to-morrow instead, and then we shall be able to get out of this unpleasant atmosphere at the earliest possible moment."
"Stop! stop!"