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“Can you tell if anyone saw him carrying the–the thing away?”

“No one in this street–I was looking.”

“Nor coming back?”

“No one.”

“Nor going out in the morning?”

“I do not think it.”

“Have you a servant?”

“Only a woman who comes at nine in the morning for an hour.”

“Does she know Larry?”

“No.”

“Friends, acquaintances?”

“No; I am very quiet. And since I knew your brother, I see no one. Nobody comes here but him for a long time now.”

“How long?”

“Five months.”

“Have you been out to-day?”

“No.”

“What have you been doing?”

“Crying.”

It was said with a certain dreadful simplicity, and pressing her hands together, she went on:

“He is in danger, because of me. I am so afraid for him.” Holding up his hand to check that emotion, he said:

“Look at me!”

She fixed those dark eyes on him, and in her bare throat, from which the coat had fallen back, he could see her resolutely swallowing down her agitation.

“If the worst comes to the worst, and this man is traced to you, can you trust yourself not to give my brother away?”

Her eyes shone. She got up and went to the fireplace:

“Look! I have burned all the things he has given me–even his picture. Now I have nothing from him.”

Keith, too, got up.

“Good! One more question: Do the police know you, because–because of your life?”

She shook her head, looking at him intently, with those mournfully true eyes. And he felt a sort of shame.

“I was obliged to ask. Do you know where he lives?”

“Yes.”

“You must not go there. And he must not come to you, here.”

Her lips quivered; but she bowed her head. Suddenly he found her quite close to him, speaking almost in a whisper:

“Please do not take him from me altogether. I will be so careful. I will not do anything to hurt him; but if I cannot see him sometimes, I shall die. Please do not take him from me.” And catching his hand between her own, she pressed it desperately. It was several seconds before Keith said:

“Leave that to me. I will see him. I shall arrange. You must leave that to me.”

“But you will be kind?”

He felt her lips kissing his hand. And the soft moist touch sent a queer feeling through him, protective, yet just a little brutal, having in it a shiver of sensuality. He withdrew his hand. And as if warned that she had been too pressing, she recoiled humbly. But suddenly she turned, and stood absolutely rigid; then almost inaudibly whispered: “Listen! Someone out–out there!” And darting past him she turned out the light.

Almost at once came a knock on the door. He could feel–actually feel the terror of this girl beside him in the dark. And he, too, felt terror. Who could it be? No one came but Larry, she had said. Who else then could it be? Again came the knock, louder! He felt the breath of her whisper on his cheek: “If it is Larry! I must open.” He shrank back against the wall; heard her open the door and say faintly: “Yes. Please! Who?”

Light painted a thin moving line on the wall opposite, and a voice which Keith recognised answered:

“All right, miss. Your outer door’s open here. You ought to keep it shut after dark.”

God! That policeman! And it had been his own doing, not shutting the outer door behind him when he came in. He heard her say timidly in her foreign voice: “Thank you, sir!” the policeman’s retreating steps, the outer door being shut, and felt her close to him again. That something in her youth and strange prettiness which had touched and kept him gentle, no longer blunted the edge of his exasperation, now that he could not see her. They were all the same, these women; could not speak the truth! And he said brusquely:

“You told me they didn’t know you!”

Her voice answered like a sigh:

“I did not think they did, sir. It is so long I was not out in the town, not since I had Larry.”