"I don't understand."
"I think you do. Gilbert's position is that he finds himself unable to retain your money when his duty to Baker may necessitate his putting you in the dock on the capital charge."
"Mr Morice! It's--it's not true!"
"Unfortunately, it is true. Lest, however, you should think the position worse than it actually is, part of my business here is to reassure your mind on at least one point."
"Reassure my mind! Nothing will ever do that--ever! ever! And reassurance from you!--from you!"
"If matters reach a certain point--before they go too far--it is my intention to surrender myself--say, to Granger--our local representative of law and order--as having been guilty of killing that man in Cooper's Spinney."
"Mr Morice! Do you--do you mean it?"
"Certainly I mean it. Then you will have an opportunity of going into the witness-box and giving that testimony of which you have spoken. That in itself ought to be sufficient to hang me."
"Mr Morice!"
"What we have principally to do is to render it impossible that the case against me shall fail. A very trifling accident may bring the whole business to an end; especially if Ernest Gilbert puts ever such a distant finger in the pie. Against the possibility of such an accident we shall have to guard. For instance, by way of a beginning, where's that knife?"