“MY GOD!” said Freyberger. “_You!_”
“Let me get up,” said the other. “Yes, it is I; we have both been
mistaken it seems.”
Freyberger said nothing, but rose to his feet and flung the extinguished
match away. They were again in darkness, but the detective did not
strike another light.
For a moment he was too angry for speech. Certain in his own mind that
he was dealing with Klein, triumphant at having captured him, his
feelings may be imagined when he found beneath him, not the criminal for
whom he had been seeking, but the interloper, Hellier.
Hellier had also risen to his feet.
“Strike a light,” he said, “and let me see where I am. I am giddy from
that fall.”
“I will strike no light,” replied the other, in a hard voice “you can
explain yourself in the darkness. You have cast enough darkness on this
business already. You ought to be used to darkness; come, explain
yourself.”
“Explain what?” said Hellier, in an irritable voice. “It seems to me the
explanation is clear enough.”
“Make it clearer. What are you doing here? What are you meddling in
police affairs for? Eh! You are one of those confounded people who fancy
themselves, one of those people who will not see where their own
business lies. What are you doing here?”
“Seems to me, I’m talking to a fool,” replied the other. “You know well
enough why I am here. I came here to find a mutual acquaintance of ours
named Klein. If not to find him, at least, to find traces of him and to
inspect the premises. You told me this morning you did not think he had
been here, yet I find you here on the same job as myself; if you had
only been frank this would not have happened.”
“Well,” replied the other, “you have been here and have not found him,
so you had better go. I will give him your kind regards when I see him,
which will not be to-night. You have spoilt the affair as far as
possible.”
“How?”
“How? You have frightened him, that is all.”
“How?”
“How?” shouted Freyberger, “By your d—d silly attempt to follow him this
morning, that is how.”
“If I had not seen him, should we have known of his connexion with this
house?”
“A thousand times better never to have known, considering the price we
have paid for our knowledge. He was unsuspecting, now he suspects. So
long as he was unsuspecting, all the chances were in our favour. Now
they are all against us. Go, tell your young lady that. Say Inspector
Freyberger told you to tell her, and say anything else you please.”
Hellier did not reply. He felt deeply mortified, for he felt there was
truth in the words.
He re-entered the verandah and opened the door leading to the garden.
“Are you going to remain?” he asked.
“I am.”
“Well, all I can say is I am very sorry. What I did was for the best.”
“It will be a lesson to you in future,” replied the other, “to trust
people who are to be trusted, and let the police do their own work.”
“Good night,” said Hellier. Freyberger grumbled some reply and the young
man departed.
Now Hellier had committed no great fault; he had even supplied
information that might have brought the whole case to a satisfactory
termination. But Freyberger was not in a frame of mind to do justice to
the barrister.
He was jealous, and that is the fact of the matter, as jealous of the
Gyde affair as any old man has ever been of his young wife.
------------------------------------------------------------------------