"No-o. It was only occasionally you know, when you were out, and there was nothing else to do. She's rather an intelligent girl."
"Yes, she looks that."
They arrived at the works. Carstairs was proceeding to his own office, but Darwen stopped him. "Come into my room for a minute and have a chat." They sat down in the comfortable, almost luxurious office.
"Who do you think that burglar was?" Darwen looked at Carstairs with a humorous light flickering round his big brown eyes.
"Haven't any idea. Sam's in quod, still——"
"Yes—but this is Sam's mate."
A heavy frown gathered on Carstairs' brow. "How's that? Did he make a mistake? Was it me he was after, or——"
Darwen did not answer for a minute; he watched Carstairs' face thoughtfully, he seemed to be speculating on something. "No," he said, at length. "He made no mistake, not a single one; for a man who can neither read nor write he's very intelligent, but the fates were against him. Do you believe in Fate?" Darwen had a way of digressing at critical points which always jarred on the mathematically direct mind of Carstairs.
"Oh, hang Fate!"
"My dear chap! you can't. I say he made no mistakes. He came there to kill, to kill me, and he'd have done it, but I happened to be awake and I fancied I heard a noise. It was pure fancy, mind, because he was in his bare feet, and silent as a mouse. It was so much fancy, in fact, that I lay in bed debating with myself whether I should go down. I reasoned thus: Everything is quite still, but it may have been a noise that woke me. I am awake, why should I not go down? If I go down to look for burglars, I ought to be prepared to receive them, therefore I will take a loaded revolver and my nice new bull's-eye lantern. Do you know I felt quite a childish pleasure in lighting up that new bull's-eye lantern."