Another thought had flashed upon my mind. Young Mr. Pearson had driven from Duddington to see me. I had never spoken to him before and instantly I knew that his was not the voice I had heard upon the telephone. Then I knew whose voice had come to me over the wire. It was that of the man from Bradford. I wondered I had not thought of it before. But I was sure my recollection was right.
On that last afternoon, when the hospital doctor pronounced me fit to travel back to London, I took a walk with Thelma through the town, and out along the pretty road which leads to Great Casterton. We soon left the road by a footpath which took us up the hillside and into some delightful woods, part of the ancient far-reaching Rockingham Forest. There we rested together on the trunk of a big fallen elm.
Around us the sun’s rays slanting through the foliage, fell upon the gray lichen of the huge forest trees and the light green of the bracken, while the damp sweet smell of the woods greeted our nostrils—that delightful perfume which seems peculiar to rural England in summer.
“Mr. Yelverton,” exclaimed my pretty companion, gazing suddenly into my eyes. “I—I want to ask you to forgive me. This wretched affair has happened all through me. I alone am to blame for it.”
“Blame!” I echoed, as I took her hand—“what do you mean? You are certainly not to blame. It seems I have a secret enemy who tried to kill me—I don’t know why; I have done no one any harm that I know of. But to say you are to blame is absurd.”
“Doctor Feng says you should have taken heed of the warning that was sent you concerning myself,” she replied. “He thinks, too, that another attempt will probably be made upon you—so do be careful.”
“But why? Tell me why,” I demanded.
She spread out her hands in a little gesture of helplessness and drew her cream-colored sports coat more closely around her. She looked very sweet and dainty in a close fitting little pull-on hat of cherry color in fine pliable straw, a summer frock of pale gray silk striped with cherry to match her hat, and gray suede shoes and stockings.
It never struck me at the time that if she really believed Stanley to be dead she would have worn mourning.
“Doctor Feng is very concerned about you,” she declared. “Has he told you anything?”