I held my breath, and I think I must have turned pale at this unforeseen result of my information against the malefactors. I recollected the affair in Charlton Wood. What could I reply?
“It is true, Inspector Pickering, that I am acquainted with Miss Sybil Burnet, but I have reason for being confident of her innocence.”
“As you are confident of the innocence of your friend Domville—eh?” he asked dubiously with a sarcastic smile.
“Well,” I said, desperately, “I am going now, at once, to see her. And if you leave the matter in my hands and promise that I shall not be followed, I, on my part, will promise that later she shall reply to any questions you may put to her.”
He was only half-convinced.
“You take a great responsibility upon yourself, Mr Hughes,” he remarked. “Why are you so anxious that this woman’s whereabouts should not be known?”
“To avoid a scandal,” I said. “She is a gentlewoman.”
Pickering smiled again.
“Well, Mr Hughes,” he said with great reluctance, “that man Vickers has made a direct charge against her, and it must be investigated, as you quite understand, whether she be a gentlewoman or not. But I leave you to question her, on the understanding that you prevent her from warning the other two men still at liberty—Parham and Winsloe. Probably they will come here to-day to meet Vickers on his return from Germany—at any rate, we shall be here in waiting for them.”
What might not this terrible exposure mean to Sybil?