"What have you done?" I asked.
"Locked the stuff up again," he replied. "This afternoon I'll bring a portmanteau and take it away."
"What are you going to do with it?"
"Leave that to me," said he.
What was in his mind I did not know, but, for the moment, I was very glad to leave it to him. In a vague way I comforted myself with the reflection that Jaffery was a specialist in crises. It was his job, as he would have said. In the ordinary affairs of life he conducted himself like an overgrown child. In time of cataclysm he was a professional demigod. He reassured me further.
"That's where I come in. Don't worry about it any more."
"All right," said I.
And for a while he said nothing and stared at the fire. Presently he broke the silence.
"What was the poor devil playing at?" he repeated. "What, in God's name?"
And then I told him. It took a long time. I was still in the cold grip of the horror of that condemned cell, and my account was none too consecutive. There was also some argument and darting up side-tracks, which broke the continuity. It was also difficult to speak of Adrian in terms that did not tear our hearts. As a despoiler of the dead, his offence was rank. But we had loved him; and we still loved him, and he had expiated his crime by a year's unimaginable torture.