"Who is Mr. de Vos?" was the answer, given in the most unconcerned tone.
Hugh broke in: "Tell him all about it, John."
I did so, relating word for word what I had heard, with my eye fixed upon his face. He never flinched once, and there was not the smallest embarrassment in his look or manner.
"You were of course entirely mistaken," he said; "I never left my room last night after Hugh went away. Of this Mr. de Vos I know nothing--not even by name."
There was nothing for it but to be satisfied, and yet somehow I was not. I suppose my old dislike of Wilmot got the better of me and made me distrustful. Then such dear--such precious interests had been called in question--were perhaps in danger; and I could not rid myself of the great anxiety which oppressed me.
The next move was after De Vos. He had utterly and totally disappeared by the time I had obtained his address from my sister and hunted out the wretched doubtful sort of lodgings he had inhabited near Leicester Square. So the affair died a natural death, and I left England for the Continent. Could I but have foreseen what my return would bring forth!
CHAPTER III.
THE DAY AFTER THE WEDDING.
It was all true--dreadfully, awfully true--and no hideous dream. Gilbert Thorneley was dead--poisoned, murdered; and Hugh Atherton was in the hands of justice, suspected, if not actually accused, of the murder. When I came back, sick and giddy, to consciousness, there was old Hardy bending over me with a face blanched almost as white as my own must have been, and Jones the detective standing by, the deepest concern written on his countenance. Do you know what it is, that "coming to," as women express it, after a sudden mental blow has prostrated you and hurled you into the dark oblivion of insensibility? I daresay you do. You know what the return to life is; what the realization of the stunning evil which has befallen you. But God help you if you remember that your last words when conscious criminated the friend you would willingly die to save. God help you if you know you must be forced into admitting what you had rather cut out your tongue than utter, and which in your inadvertence or brainless stupidity you let pass your lips. I say again, heaven help you, for it is one of the bitterest moments of your life.