The girl drew back, with a little quick sigh, and for a moment or two there was an abashed silence on the part of Scoffold and myself. But Scoffold was never the man to be abashed long by anything; in a moment or two he leaned his big body forward over the table, so that I saw his face fully in the light of the shaded lamp, and glanced quickly from one to the other of us, and began to put questions. And with each question it seemed that he probed the matter more deeply.
"But tell me, what had my young friend done to be forbidden the house?" he asked. Then, answered in a fashion by the silence about him, he shrugged his shoulders, and spread out his great hands deprecatingly.
"Oh, I'm sorry!" he went on. "I see that I'm prying into secrets, and that was never my way at all. Only I was interested in Gregory—a fine fellow, with a future before him. A little reckless, perhaps—a little given to the spending of money; but then, that is ever a fault of the young. If I did not wish to pry into secrets," he added a little maliciously, as he peered round the lamp at the girl, "I might suggest that perhaps his disappearance may have had something to do with Miss Debora here—eh? There are so many hearts to be broken in this world of pretty faces, Miss Debora."
The girl sat rigid and silent; presently the man leaned back in his chair again, with a little laugh, as the servants entered with the next course. I saw the woman Leach hovering about near the doorway; I wondered if we were to have another such scene as we had had that morning. But nothing happened until the servants had gone, with Leach following last. Then this unlucky guest had another word to say.
"I see you still keep your faithful retainer," said Harvey Scoffold, with a jerk of his great head towards the door. "Remarkable woman, that—and quite devoted to you, doctor."
"Servants are servants, and are kept in their places," retorted Bardolph Just coldly.
"But, my dear Just," broke in the irrepressible one again, "Leach is surely more than a servant. How many years has she been with you?"
"I haven't taken the trouble to count," replied the doctor. "Shall we change the conversation?"
Mr. Scoffold abruptly complied, by turning his attention to me, somewhat to my dismay. "Do you belong to these parts, Mr.—Mr. John New?" he asked.
I murmured in a low tone that I belonged to London, and as I spoke I saw him lean forward quickly, as if to get a better glimpse of me; but I obstinately kept my face in shadow.