“On Friday, then,” he said, addressing Stapleton. “On Thursday night we may not meet, you will both be so very busy, or should I say so much in demand? Unless of course you invite me to join your party. So good-by for the moment.”
Stapleton did not go down to see him out, nor did he ring for the servant. Instead, he shut the door directly the little man had left the room.
The front door slammed, and still the two sat in silence. At last Jessica said in a metallic voice:
“What are we to do, Aloysius?”
“There is nothing to be done,” he answered. “We must go on paying, and paying, until——”
“Until what?”
Suddenly his expression changed. Then, after a pause, he said:
“Supposing Levi were to die unexpectedly; how convenient it would be, Jessica.”
Their eyes met, and he knew that the same thought had just occurred to Jessica.
“People die suddenly of all sort of common complaints,” he went on. “Heart failure, apoplexy, stoppage of the heart’s action, natural causes——Supposing he died of a natural cause,” he added in an undertone.