Part 36

He became more urgent.

"And you employed me, Miss Sloane; you appealed to me when you were at a loss where to turn. I'm only fair to myself as well as to you when I tell you that your distress, far more than financial considerations, persuaded me to undertake this work without first consulting your father."

She leaned toward him, bending from the waist, her eyes slightly widened, so that their effect was to give her a startled air.

"You don't mean you'll give it up!" she said, plainly entreating. "You won't give it up!"

"Are you quite sure you don't want me to give it up? Judge Wilton has asked me twice, out of politeness, not to give it up. Are you merely being polite?"

She smiled, looking tired, and shook her head.

"Really, Mr. Hastings, if you were to desert us now, I should be desperate--altogether. Desperate! Just that."

"I can't desert you," he said gently. "As I told Mr. Webster, I know too little and I suspect too much to do that."

Before she spoke again, she looked at him intently, drawing in her under lip a little against her teeth.

"What, Mr. Hastings?" she asked, then. "What do you suspect?"

"Let me answer that with a question," he suggested. "Last night, your one idea was that I could protect you and your father, everybody in the house here, by acting as your spokesman. I think you wanted to set me up as a buffer between all of you on the one side and the authorities and the reporters on the other. You wanted things kept down, nothing to get out beyond that which was unavoidable. Wasn't that it?"

"Yes; it was," she admitted, not seeing where his question led.

"You were afraid, then, that something incriminating might be divulged, weren't you?"

"Oh, no!" she denied instantly.

"I mean something which might seem incriminating. You trusted the person whom it would seem to incriminate; and you wanted time for the murderer to be found without, in the meantime, having the adverse circumstance made public. Isn't that it, Miss Sloane?"

"Yes--practically."

"Let's be clear on that. Your fear was that too much questioning of you or the other person might result in a slip-up--might make you or him mention the apparently damaging incident, with disastrous effect. Wasn't that it?"

"Yes; that was it."

"Now, what was that apparently incriminating incident?"

She started. He had brought her so directly to the confession that she saw now the impossibility of withholding what he sought.

"It may be," he tried to lighten her responsibility, "the very thing that Webster and the judge have concealed--for I'm sure they're keeping something back. Perhaps, if I knew it, things would be easier. People closely affected by a crime are the last to judge such things accurately."

She gave a long breath of relief, looking at him with perplexity nevertheless.

"Yes--I know. That was why I came to you--last night--in the beginning."

"And it was about them, Webster and Wilton," he drew the conclusion for her, still encouraging her with his smile, regarding her over the rims of his spectacles with a fatherly kindness.

She turned from him and looked out of the window. It was the middle of a hot, still day, no breeze stirring, and wonderfully quiet. For the moment, there was no sound, in the house or outside.

"Oh!" she cried, her voice a revelation of the extent to which her doubts had oppressed her. "It was like that, out there--quiet, still! If you could only understand!"

"My dear child," he said, "rely on me. The sheriff is bound to assert himself, to keep in the front of things; he's that kind of a man. He'll make an arrest any time, or announce that he will. Don't you see the danger?" He leaned forward and took her hand, a move to which she seemed oblivious. "Don't you see I must have facts to go on--if I'm to help you?"

At that, she disengaged her hand, and sat very straight, her face again a little turned from him. A twitch, like a shudder cut short, moved her whole body, so that the heel of her slipper rapped smartly on the floor.