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Page 25
"He is afraid of something."
"He is afraid of Fire-Tongue--whatever Fire-Tongue may be! I
never saw a man of proved courage more afraid in my life. He
prefers to court arrest for complicity in a murder rather than
tell what he knows!"
"It's unbelievable."
"It would be, Innes, if Nicol Brinn's fears were personal."
Paul Harley checked his steps in front of the watchful secretary
and gazed keenly into his eyes.
"Death has no terrors for Nicol Brinn," he said slowly. "All his
life he has toyed with danger. He admitted to me that during the
past seven years he had courted death. Isn't it plain enough,
Innes? If ever a man possessed all that the world had to offer,
Nicol Brinn is that man. In such a case and in such circumstances
what do we look for?"
Innes shook his head.
"We look for the woman!" snapped Paul Harley.
There came a rap at the door and Miss Smith, the typist, entered.
"Miss Phil Abingdon and Doctor McMurdoch," she said.
"Good heavens!" muttered Harley. "So soon? Why, she can only
just--" He checked himself. "Show them in, Miss Smith," he
directed.
As the typist went out, followed by Innes, Paul Harley found
himself thinking of the photograph in Sir Charles Abingdon's
library and waiting with an almost feverish expectancy for the
appearance of the original.
Almost immediately Phil Abingdon came in, accompanied by the
sepulchral Doctor McMurdoch. And Harley found himself wondering
whether her eyes were really violet-coloured or whether intense
emotion heroically repressed had temporarily lent them that
appearance.
Surprise was the predominant quality of his first impression. Sir
Charles Abingdon's daughter was so exceedingly vital--petite and
slender, yet instinct with force. The seeming repose of the
photograph was misleading. That her glance could be naive he
realized--as it could also be gay--and now her eyes were sad with
a sadness so deep as to dispel the impression of lightness
created by her dainty form, her alluring, mobile lips, and the
fascinating, wavy, red-brown hair.
She did not wear mourning. He recalled that there had been no
time to procure it. She was exquisitely and fashionably dressed,
and even the pallor of grief could not rob her cheeks of the
bloom born of Devon sunshine. He had expected her to be pretty.
He was surprised to find her lovely.
Doctor McMurdoch stood silent in the doorway, saying nothing by
way of introduction. But nothing was necessary. Phil Abingdon
came forward quite naturally--and quite naturally Paul Harley
discovered her little gloved hand to lie clasped between both his
own. It was more like a reunion than a first meeting and was so
laden with perfect understanding that, even yet, speech seemed
scarcely worth while.
Thinking over that moment, in later days, Paul Harley remembered
that he had been prompted by some small inner voice to say: "So
you have come back?" It was recognition. Of the hundreds of men
and women who came into his life for a while, and ere long went
out of it again, he knew, by virtue of that sixth sense of his,
that Phil Abingdon had come to stay--whether for joy or sorrow he
could not divine.
It was really quite brief--that interval of silence--although
perhaps long enough to bridge the ages.
"How brave of you, Miss Abingdon!" said Harley. "How wonderfully
brave of you!"
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