He rewarded me for that remark with a scowl, and went on again with the work in hand. Now and then he gave a quick order, half under his breath, to the obedient Martha Leach, who waited upon him slavishly; under his direction she presently bound up the arm, after cutting splints for it according to a fashion he told her. Then, in obedience to a sign from him, she brought him a small glass of spirits, which he drank quickly; I saw the colour begin to come back into his white face.
"That was an ordeal, Harvey," he said. "Upon my word, I didn't think I had the courage. I think it'll mend all right now; both bones were shattered."
He took not the faintest notice of me, as he presently laid his hand in a sling which the woman Leach dexterously twisted round his neck. He nodded to her in token that she should go; and she went slowly out of the room, carrying the cloth and basin with her; she gave me a deadly look as she passed me. But for her looks I no longer cared.
Perhaps the least composed of the three of us was Harvey Scoffold; he fidgeted about from one foot to the other, and strove to whistle a tune; and all the while glanced furtively at Bardolph Just or at myself. Bardolph Just, for his part, stood like a man slowly making up his mind to something; I saw, besides, that he was raging within himself with pain, and mortification, and chagrin, and could with difficulty control his feelings. When at last he looked up he repeated that question he had asked before.
"Why did you shoot me?"
"I preferred to shoot you rather than see murder done; I meant to kill you, if I could, because I counted your life more worthless than that of Miss Debora Matchwick."
"I was not going to kill her," he said sullenly.
"No," I answered him, "there was to be an accident, and no one would have been more sorry than her dear, devoted guardian at the deplorable result of that accident! You need not lie to me, Dr. Just; your accomplice has already given the game away."
He glanced quickly at Harvey Scoffold, and that gentleman merely shrugged his shoulders and spread out his hands protestingly; but I saw that the doctor believed that Scoffold had been made to speak. The doctor walked across to the window, and stood there looking out for some time. He spoke at last, without turning his head.
"You constitute yourself judge and executioner both," he said. "If you had killed me I think it must have proved a hanging matter for you, Mr. Jail-bird."