“It doesn’t seem to matter much what I think,” he cried with a slight return of his old petulance. “And perhaps it would be wiser to admit at once that I don’t possess your capacity for weighing facts and drawing deductions from them. I should like to know one thing, Mr. Lane—does what has just happened convey any new suggestions to you, throw any fresh light upon the situation?”
He did not gauge the detective as accurately as one might have expected from a man with his wide knowledge of human nature, or he would never have put this question in the hope of getting a satisfactory answer. Whatever theory or theories might be forming in his mind, and there could be no doubt that it was working at full-speed all the time, and readjusting itself to every fresh turn of events, Lane would make no disclosures till he judged the time was ripe.
He shook his head with great gravity: “We work very slowly, Mr. Morrice; we come to conclusions with equal slowness, in our profession. I dare say to a keen business man like yourself who plan your coups with lightning rapidity, make and clinch a deal of many thousands in a few minutes, we must seem dull, plodding fellows. But you must remember that most of our time we are working underground where very little light penetrates. What has happened to-day may suggest a new line of thought to me, but I have not yet had time to digest its significance. It will want a great deal of patient thinking over before it bears any fruit.”
With this the rather impatient financier had to be content. He was beginning to have a certain respect for the firm, self-reliant attitude of the detective, who did not appear to be in the least overawed by Morrice’s wealth and position. And he had a shrewd idea that, in his own particular and less remunerative line, Lane had a brain not greatly inferior to his own. They worked in different directions with a vast disproportion between the rewards attending their efforts. Morrice had the instinct of moneymaking, Lane the instinct of unravelling criminal mysteries. Perhaps in the bare fact of intellectual equipment there was not much to choose between them.
As the detective passed through the hall on his way out, he found Rosabelle waiting for him. She was of course cognizant of what had happened, and on Lane’s arrival her first idea had been to be present at the interview between him and her uncle. But on second thoughts she had decided to speak to the detective alone.
She still loved her uncle very dearly; she must always do that for all the kindness and affection he had lavished on her. But it was impossible there should not be a little secret antagonism between the two in the circumstances. He appeared to be firmly convinced of Richard Croxton’s guilt, she as firmly convinced of his innocence. She was a fair-minded girl, and she was prepared to make every allowance for Morrice’s attitude, but as there did not seem any common ground on which they could meet when the matter was under discussion, she judged it best to speak of it to him as little as possible.
She put to him practically the same question that her uncle had done: “Well, Mr. Lane, what do you think of the new development? Does it reveal anything to you?”
That wary and cautious person shook his head. He had taken a great liking to Rosabelle. Her staunch devotion to her lover had appealed to the finer chords of his nature; for although he never allowed sentiment to sway him unduly, he was by no means destitute of that human quality. But not even for Rosabelle’s sake would he depart greatly from that cautious attitude which was habitual to him.
“It is a strange development, Miss Sheldon, but I have not yet had time to think it over. I am going back to my office to do so, and the thinking over will take some time.”
Her charming face fell. “You cannot see in it even the remotest thing that tells in favour of Richard Croxton?”