“Didn’t Collins or Andrews chance to mention my name to you, when they made their call last night; or happen to say they had missed connections with Dr. Frank Hitchens?” he finally inquired, cunningly, Elmer thought.
Wee Willie shook his head in the negative.
“Why, no, sir, not a word did those guards say about having any one else along,” he hastened to explain. “They had a dog with them, a sort of hound, I reckon, because he had long ears, and bayed like one; but somehow they didn’t seem to get a whiff of the scent of the escaped lunatic.”
Wee Willie was wise enough not to say anything concerning the fact that they had frightened some one away from the cabin on first arriving. Since they were now of the opinion that party had been Mr. Codling, Amos’s long-missing parent, it was only fair to that comrade nothing be said about his presence near by.
“By the way,” continued the doctor, with glittering eyes, “did the guards happen to mention the name of the—er, runaway?” and Elmer thought he caught a slight chuckle when that last word was forcibly pronounced.
“Why, yes, they told us his name was, let me see, Felix Something or other—oh! yes, Felix Gould; and that he was a mighty clever chap—used to be an actor in his palmy days, too, and just wonderfully smart.”
“He is all of that,” commented the other, with a faint smile on his face. “In fact, I don’t believe I ever ran across a more engaging chap in all my wide experience than this same Felix Gould. The world had not treated his genius right, which was the main cause for all his mental troubles. But then they say everything comes to him who waits; and there are times when even walls do not a prison make. Life still has compensations for all the ills flesh is heir to.”
His manner was really quite dramatic when saying this, Elmer noticed. As for Wee Willie, somehow he seemed to have fallen under the spell of the other’s masterful manner, for he sat there, and listened as though entranced, hardly able to take his eyes off the doctor’s mobile face.
And then with the abruptness shown by a bolt of lightning coming from what had been considered a clear sky, a thought suddenly sped through Elmer’s brain. It dazzled him, too, at first by its brilliance, yes, and thrilled him at the same time on account of the element of danger that accompanied the revelation.
Once this idea seized hold of him, Elmer watched the face of Dr. Hitchens more closely than ever. He was trying to read the secret of those rapidly working features, those glittering eyes, and the strange smile that every now and then crept into view, as though the physician might be taking infinite satisfaction in having found such a ready convert to his views in Wee Willie, whom he had apparently well-nigh hypnotized.