"I do that," replied the other quickly, "because in that way I can cover up the miserable business of young Pennington. Unless you speak, it is scarcely likely that anyone else will ever drag that business into the light of day. Both Gregory Pennington and our friend here happen to have been particularly alone in the world: in neither case is there anyone who is likely to make awkward inquiries."
"Always excepting the girl," Harvey Scoffold reminded him. "So far as I am concerned, you have nothing to fear from me; I shall merely be an amused spectator of the little comedy; I don't know yet exactly how it's going to end."
He was tactful enough to say nothing more then, and we presently drifted, almost with cheerfulness, into some more ordinary conversation. Yet I saw that the man watched us both from between half-closed eyelids while he smoked and lounged in his chair; and I was far from comfortable. It was late when the doctor rose, and with a glance at the clock said that he had still much work to do before he could sleep. He unlocked the door; at which hint Harvey Scoffold and I left him for the night.
The excitement of the meeting had quite thrust out of my mind the question whether the man was stopping in the house or had merely come there as a chance visitor; but the question was answered now, when Harvey Scoffold told me that he had a long walk before him, and was glad that the night was fine. I felt some sudden uplifting of the heart at the thought that at least I should be relieved of his presence, only to feel that heart sinking the next moment, at the remembrance that he would be free to spread his news in the outer world, if he cared to do so. For it must be understood that my public trial, and all the disclosures thereat, had given to the world the address of my uncle, and my own movements on those secret expeditions of mine; it was possible for Harvey Scoffold to put that veiled threat of his into instant execution.
I knew, moreover, that he was a dangerous man, by reason of the fact that he was chronically in want of money, and had never hesitated as to the methods employed to obtain it. However, there was no help for it now; the murder was out, and I could only trust to that extraordinary luck that had befriended me up to the present.
I walked with him out into the grounds, and he shook hands with me at parting, with some cordiality. "You have had a miraculous escape, dear boy," he said, in his jovial fashion, "and you are quite a little romance in yourself. I shall watch your career with interest. And you have nothing to fear—I shall be as silent as the grave in which you ought to be lying."
He laughed noisily at that grim jest, and took his way down the road in the direction of London. I went back into the house and went to my room, and slept heavily until late the next morning.
The doctor had left the house when I went down to breakfast, and I had a dim hope that I might see the girl alone. But she did not put in an appearance, nor did I see anything of her until the evening, when the doctor had returned, and the three of us sat down to dinner. I had been roaming desolately about the grounds, smoking the doctor's cigars, and inwardly wondering what I was going to do with the rest of the life that had been miraculously given back to me; and I did not know at what hour Bardolph Just had returned. Yet I had a feeling that there had been some strange interview between the doctor and the girl before I had come upon the scene—and a stormy interview at that. Bardolph Just sat at his end of the table, grim and silent, with his brows contracted, and with his habitual smile gone from his lips; the girl sat white and silent, sipping a little wine, but touching no food. During the course of a melancholy meal no single word was heard in the room, for the doctor did not even address the servants.
At the end of the meal, however, when the girl rose to quit the room, the doctor rose also, and barred her way. "Stop!" he said quickly. "I've got to speak to you. We'll have this matter cleared up—once and for all."
"I have nothing more to say," she replied, looking at him steadily. "My answer is what it has always been—No!"