"You are not a policeman, or a detective, or a private inquiry agent, or anything of that kind--you swear it?"
"Very willingly. I am simply a poor devil of a clerk out of a situation. Why you should object to me, or, still more, why you should fear me, I have not the faintest notion."
He hesitated before he spoke again--then his tone was sullen.
"I don't know if you are lying: I expect you are: but anyhow, I'll chance it. I fancy that I'm about your match, if it's tricks you're after. If I let you get up, can I trust you?"
"You can: again I give you my word for it."
He let me rise. When I had done so, and was brushing the dust off my clothes, I took his measure. Even by the imperfect light I could see how shabby he was, and how hollow his cheeks were. He seemed to have shrunk to half his size since that first short interview I had had with him.
"You will excuse my saying you don't look as if you have been living in clover."
"I haven't. I am nearly starving. It is that which has brought me back."
"Why did you ever go? Mrs. Barnes tells me that you are her husband. I should imagine that you had a pretty comfortable birth of it."
He glowered at me with renewed suspicion. "Oh, she has told you so much, has she? What has she told you more?"