e
us from unpleasantness!"

He spoke more slowly now, as if he cudgelled his brain for the most
biting sarcasm, the most unbearable insolence.

"Don't realize the seriousness!--Flat-headed fiends!--Are you any nearer
the truth now than you were at the start?--Try to understand this, Mr.
Hastings: you're discharged, fired! From now on, I'm in charge of what
goes on in this house. If there's any trouble to be avoided, I'll attend
to it. Get that!--and get out!"

Hastings, opening his mouth for angry retort, checked himself. He stood
a moment silent, shaken by the effort it cost him to maintain his
self-control.

"Humph!" Sloane's nasal, twangy exclamation was clearly intended to
provoke him further.

But, without a word, he turned and left the room. Passing the screen
near the door, he heard Jarvis snicker, a discreet echo of Sloane's
goading ridicule.

On his way back to the parlour, the old man made up his mind to discount
Sloane's behaviour.

"I've got to take a chance," he counselled himself, "but I know I'm
right in doing it. A big responsibility--but I'm right!"

Then he submitted this report:

"He says nothing new, Crown. Far as I can make out, nothing unusual
waked him up that night--except chronic nervousness; he turned on that
light to find some medicine; he knew nothing of the murder until Judge
Wilton called him."

"Humph!" growled Crown. "And you fall for that!"

Hastings eyed him sternly. "It's the statement I'm going to give to the
reporters."

The sheriff was silent, irresolute. Hastings congratulated himself on
his earlier deduction: that Crown, unable to frighten Sloane into
communicativeness, was thankful for an excuse to withdraw.

Hendricks had reported the two-hour conference between Crown and Mrs.
Brace late that afternoon. Hastings decided now: "The man's in cahoots
with her. His ally! And he won't act until he's had another session with
her.--And she won't advise an arrest for a day or two anyway. Her game
is to make him play on Sloane's nerves for a while. She advises threats,
not arrests--which suits me, to a T!"

He fought down a chuckle, thinking of that alliance.

Crown corroborated his reasoning.

"All right, Hastings," he said doggedly. "I'm not going back to his
room. I gave him his chance. He can take the consequences."

"What consequences?"

"I'd hardly describe 'em to his personal representative, would I? But
you can take this from me: they'll come soon enough--