"And yet you almost saw him killed?"
"Had I come into the hall half a moment sooner I might have seen the murderer in the act of perpetrating his crime."
This time he laughed right out--an evil laugh.
"For goodness' sake, man, don't laugh like that--it makes me shiver."
He was still, with a stillness which, somehow, I did not care to break. A far-away look began to come into his face. He seemed to become lost in thought. When, after a long interval, during which I was sufficiently engaged in watching the different expressions which seem to chase each other across his face, he broke the silence, it was as though he muttered to himself, oblivious of his companion and of the place in which he was: "What a woman she is!"
That was what he said. I caught the words as he uttered them beneath his breath--uttered them, as it seemed, half in admiration, half in scorn. And he again was still.
CHAPTER VIII
["MURDERER!"]
He would not go home. I spent, I daresay, an hour in seeking to persuade him. I pointed out the injury he was doing to himself, the wrong which he was doing his wife. I went further--I more than hinted at the suspicions which might fall upon him in connection with the Rothwell murder; plainly asserting that it would be the part of wisdom, to speak of nothing else, for him to put in an appearance on the scene, look the business squarely in the face, and see it boldly through. But he was not to be induced. The most that I could get from him was a promise that he would come to the front, to use his own words, "when the time was ripe"--what he meant by them was more than I could tell. In return, he extracted a promise from me that I would say nothing of our meeting to his wife until he gave me leave--a promise which was only given on the strength of his solemn asseveration that such silence on my part would be best for his wife's sake, and for mine. He would give me no address. In reply to my fishing inquiries into the mystery of his personal action he maintained an impenetrable reserve--he was not to be drawn. One thing he did condescend to do: he borrowed all the loose cash which I had in my pockets.
Mrs. Barnes had supplied me with a latchkey; I had been accustomed to let myself in with it when I was late. My surprise was therefore considerable when, directly I inserted the key in the lock, the door was opened from within, and there confronting me stood the ubiquitous new waiter, with the inevitable smile upon his face.