Fyles lost nothing of what was passing. The thing he saw in the girl’s face needed no searching to interpret. All her ungoverned anger had leaped at the sight of her old playmate. But the Wolf was only questioning, painfully questioning.
Fyles stood aside for the girl to enter. Annette did so. And recklessness seemed to urge her gait. For a moment Fyles feared for what she might do. He closed the door, and, all unobserved, slipped the catch of the spring lock. Then he indicated the chair on which the Wolf had been sitting.
“Will you sit right here by the stove?” he said, addressing Annette. Then he quickly set another chair near by to the desk, and offered it to the Wolf. The youth moved automatically towards it and sat. Annette remained standing at the stove.
Fyles turned to her.
“Is there a thing I can do for you?” he asked quietly.
“Yes.” Annette’s gaze was fixed. Her expression had died to a smoulder of its original fury, as she looked straight into the eyes of her old playmate. “You ken take him. You ken hand him to penitentiary. He’s shot Ernie Sinclair to death. I saw him!”
For an instant her eyes blazed. Then she turned to the stove and looked down at the glowing patch where the iron had reddened.
The atmosphere of the gathering had become electrical. It was charged with every possibility which human emotion could suggest. The yellow lamplight fostered significance of it all. Fyles sat down at the desk and looked at both his visitors in turn.
These two had been raised together—he knew that—like brother and sister—playmates. Now they were confronting each other in a deadly encounter. One, at least, was in a fury of hate, seeking a vengeance that knew no limits. It was a dire exhibition of the driving passions which go to make up the sum of human life.
“You saw him? You saw the Wolf shoot Constable Sinclair to death? You’re charging him with murder? Will you tell us?”