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You would still have done your best and you would probably still have succeeded. You don't care about trifling with Eternity, eh? Very well, I will find the place for you." Hilditch's fingers strayed along his shirt-front until he found a certain spot. Then he leaned the dagger against it, his forefinger and second finger pressed against the hilt. His eyes were fixed upon his guest's.
"What were Hilditch's movements that evening?" Wilmore asked. "Not a soul seems to have seen him after he left Regent Street," was the somewhat puzzled answer. "His own story was quite straightforward and has never been contradicted. He let himself into his house with a latch-key after his return from the Cafe Royal, drank a whisky and soda in the library, and went to bed before half-past eleven.
"You have nothing more to say?" "Nothing! Only I wish to God I'd never stepped into that Mayfair agency. I wish I'd never gone to Mrs. Hilditch's as a temporary butler. I wish I'd never seen any one of you! That's all. You can go to Hell which way you like, only, if you take my advice, you'll go by the way of South America. The scaffold isn't every man's fancy."
The manager hurried away to receive a newly-arrived guest. Francis and his friend exchanged a wondering glance. "Father of Oliver Hilditch's wife," Wilmore observed, "the most munificent patron of boxing in the world, Vice President of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and self-confessed arch-criminal! He pulled our legs pretty well!" "I suppose so," Francis assented absently.
It seemed to him that the woman, still colourless, again marvellously gowned, greeted him coldly. His host, however, was almost too effusive. There was no other guest, but the prompt announcement of dinner dispelled what might have been a few moments of embarrassment after Oliver Hilditch's almost too cordial greeting. The woman laid her fingers upon her guest's coat-sleeve.
"I have some clothes in my locker. Don't be long. And, by-the-bye, which shall it be Bohemia or Mayfair? I'll telephone for a table. London's so infernally full, these days." Francis hesitated. "I really don't care," he confessed. "Now I think of it, I shall be glad to get away from here, though. I don't want any more congratulations on saving Oliver Hilditch's life.
Francis looked at him in surprise. The man was evidently agitated. Somehow or other, his face was vaguely familiar. "Who are you, and what do you want with me?" Francis asked. "I was butler to Mr. Hilditch, sir," the man replied. "I waited upon you the night you dined there, sir the night of Mr. Hilditch's death." "Well?"
He forged a letter from my father, begging me, if I found it in any way possible, to listen to Oliver Hilditch's proposals, and hinting guardedly at a very serious financial crisis which it was in his power to avert. It never occurred to me or to my chaperon to question his bona fides. He had lived under the same roof as my father, and knew all the intimate details of his life.
A reception clerk and a deputy manager had already hastened forward. The newcomer waved them back for a moment. Bareheaded, he had taken Margaret Hilditch's hands in his and raised them to his lips. "I came as quickly as I could," he said. "There was the usual delay, of course, at Marseilles, and the trains on were terrible. So all has ended well."
You have been his guest at The Sanctuary, and there is a rumour, sir you will pardon me if I seem to be taking a liberty that you are engaged to be married to his daughter, Oliver Hilditch's widow." "You seem to be tolerably well informed as to my affairs, Shopland," Francis remarked. "Only so far as regards your associations with Sir Timothy," was the deprecating reply.
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