The scarred young man, his face still a mass of sticking-plaster, stood with clenched fists facing me, and:
"Get out!" was his greeting—"before I throw you out."
"My dear sir," I said, "unless you particularly want to figure in a very undignified light as a witness in a trial for murder, sit down and listen to me."
Edward Hines hesitated, opening and closing his hands and glaring at me in a preposterous fury.
"What's the game?" he demanded. "What are you talking about?"
"I am talking of 'the Oritoga mystery,'" I replied.
"The Oritoga mystery?"
His expression changed, and he dropped down into an armchair from which he had evidently arisen upon hearing my voice below. I observed a copy of a daily paper lying upon the carpet, and the conspicuous headline was sufficient to show me that he had actually been reading the latest reports concerning the case at the time of my arrival. I had judged my man pretty accurately by this time, and drawing up another chair which stood near me I sat down facing him, holding out my open cigar-case.
"I quite understand your sensitiveness in the circumstances," I said soothingly; "but there is no occasion to suppose that I have come to remind you of your misfortune. Have a cigar. I want a chat with you."
He continued to watch me in a lowering way, but I was gradually getting him in hand. With very poor grace he accepted a cigar, lighted it, and threw the match away without offering to light mine. I did not appear to notice his churlishness, but immediately approached the matter about which I had come.