Three days later Esther sat by the window in the hotel sitting-room of the Cliffords' suite, waiting for Roger. She had made rapid progress during the past twenty-four hours, but she still felt rather wan and tremulous, as though she had been through a long illness. Moreover she now knew all there was to know about the affair in which she had played a leading part. She had insisted on being told what had happened to Lady Clifford, and in spite of the inevitable shock to her nerves she had since felt steadier. She had now beside her all the papers containing accounts of the death of the Frenchwoman and the disappearance of Dr. Sartorius, both well-known figures in Cannes, and she had read with the keenest interest all the diverse theories which strove to connect the two events. Up till now not one report had hit upon the true facts of the case; all the stories were wide of the mark, and the general impression given to the public was that in some mysterious way the doctor was responsible for his employer's catastrophic end. There was one garbled account which mentioned her own name—gleaned, most likely, from one of the French servants at the villa—but so far Roger, in his determination to prevent the Press from persecuting her, had kept her well out of it.

It seemed almost unbelievable that after three whole days so little of the actual affair should be known. The sensation caused was a big one, but it remained in the nature of an enigma. Rumour in several quarters had it that Lady Clifford had simply committed suicide because of the desertion of her lover. The result of the inquest was not yet known. and the fact that the death was due to an accident was difficult for most people to grasp.

Esther, however, knew how the awful thing had happened, and amid her complex emotions she was conscious of a sort of admiration for the Frenchwoman's courage in setting out as she must have done, in the darkness and rain, on her perilous mission—a mission she had all but accomplished, too, for it had now been established that the bottle upon the shelf in Roger's bathroom contained pure Evian water, innocent of contamination. ThÉrÈse had therefore effected the exchange and was on her return journey when she lost her balance.

Looking out upon the Croisette and the harbour beyond, where the myriad lights of yachts began to twinkle in the violet dusk, Esther drew a deep breath and assembled her thoughts more calmly than she had as yet been able to do. The terrible experience through which she had passed had left its imprint upon her; she was still ready to jump at the slightest sound, or even, absurdly, to burst into tears. Yet deep within her was a warm consciousness of security, an earnest of happiness to come. No word of actual love had been spoken between her and Roger, she had not been alone with him since that night at the villa, yet it was enough for her to recall the pressure of his face against her hands and the hungry way in which his eyes had dwelt upon her. In that hour she had learned how much she mattered to him. She closed her eyes now and revelled in the delicious certainty of what was coming to her. Her heart beat almost as it had done during those dreadful moments in the laboratory which she was striving to forget; it thumped against her ribs with great blows, so that instinctively she put her hands upon her breast to quiet it.

"What an idiot I am to take so much for granted," she reflected, chiding herself. "Suppose I'm mistaken about him after all?"

She knew she wasn't mistaken. She also knew that old Miss Clifford scented a romance, was indeed keeping out of the way now to let her be alone with Roger. This was the first time that Esther had had her clothes on; the old lady had helped her to dress, unpacking with her own hands the little steamer-trunk that had been fetched from the Route de Grasse, and given orders to the chambermaid to press all its contents and put them in order.

Esther glanced down at her frock. It was the peach-coloured one she had worn that night when she had danced at the Ambassadeurs. It felt a little loose upon her now, for she had lost a good deal of weight, perhaps six or seven pounds, she reflected. Her hair needed trimming, the curly bronze locks played about her neck and ears in a fashion that stirred her displeasure. Still, that could soon be remedied; she would take herself in hand at once. She was glad to be in mufti for a bit, to indulge with a clear conscience in a riot of feminine distractions. Even to sit here quietly, her hands in her lap, after the storm she had passed through, was in itself a luxury. Her feeling of security and well-being was so acute that the realisation of it brought a little stab of almost pain, while tears, so close to the surface now, rushed into her eyes.

It was at this moment that the door opened and Roger came in, his arms filled with an immense bunch of pale pink roses. She rose hurriedly, brushing the tears away with a feeling of shame, and smiling at him. He came close and looked with a grave face at the drops still clinging to her lashes.

"What are those for?" he inquired in a serious tone.

"Nothing at all. If I tell you, you'll think me such a fool! I—I was only thinking to myself how happy I was to be alive, and—and all that."

He looked down at her for a long moment with so penetrating a gaze that she grew embarrassed.

"There—that's the look of yours I like so much," he said at last, watching her colour rise. "You know you are just a nice child, Esther—an awfully nice child! That's how I first thought of you."

With a gesture half-afraid he put up one finger and touched a tendril of hair that had strayed loose on her neck. She felt shyer than before, and turned her attention to the roses.

"For me?" she asked, burying her face in their cool depths. "How too beautiful! I don't think I've ever seen roses so lovely before. There's—there's something special about them, somehow," she added truthfully.

"There is," he replied gravely, as he deposited his burden on the table.

Suddenly tongue-tied, she made an effort to speak naturally of other matters, avoiding the personal.

"Any news of … of that man?" she inquired.

Stupid that she still could not speak of him easily!

Roger saw that a faint shadow had darkened her upturned eyes, and it cut him to the heart.

"No, nothing yet—but don't let that distress you. The fellow is bound to be caught; it's only a question of time. You are not to be worried about it. Look at me! You are worrying, this minute."

"I'm not at all," she denied stoutly. "Why should I bother about him—now?"

For answer he drew forward the biggest arm-chair and gently made her sit down. The slight hollow of her delicate cheek, the dark circles under the eyes, caused him acute suffering.

"Seriously, Esther, when I think of what you have been through, when I think that it must have left a terrible impression on you and that nothing I can do can remove that impression, it is almost more than I can bear. I feel it is all our fault."

"How perfectly absurd! It was nobody's fault. And you ought to be thankful it has turned out as it has. I am, I can tell you. As for me, I shall get over this, don't worry! I'm not neurotic or anything queer, whatever that man wanted to make you believe. I am really frightfully normal."

"Yes, thank God! I feel an ass to think I could ever have doubted it."

"I don't know. When I think what I must have looked like bursting in on you that night—a sort of Curfew-Shall-Not-Ring-To-night, I suppose—I don't wonder at anyone's thinking me a lunatic. How I ever got there at all is a mystery to me. I believe I was unconscious part of the time. I scarcely remember it; the whole thing seems like a sort of feverish nightmare. When the taxi came to a standstill I simply gave everything up for lost. I only set out to walk that last mile in a sort of dogged desperation; I never thought I should get there, or that if I did it would be in time. It was all uphill, too. I remember the perspiration running in trickles with the rain down my face, all in my eyes, so that I could scarcely see. Every little while I just toppled over altogether and lay on the sidewalk. It was the purest good luck that I wasn't run in for a drunken person. That would have finished it!"

"My dear!"

"Oh, well, let's not talk about it any more. I want to forget all that part of it—if I can."

He sat down close to her on the window-seat, silent for a moment. Then he said:

"Esther, tell me one thing. What first put the suspicion into your head that there was something not quite straight about my father's illness?"

She knit her brow and thought hard for a bit.

"I hardly know," she replied at last. "It's awfully difficult to say. There were certain tiny, unimportant things that I noticed, even before I took on the case, but taken separately not one would have meant anything much. I don't believe I can say exactly when I first began to feel uncomfortable about the situation. Perhaps I shouldn't have done so at all if it hadn't been for the pure accident of overhearing a conversation between your stepmother and Captain Holliday that afternoon I told you about."

"I know you saw them together, but you never told me you heard what they were talking about."

"Well, I did hear quite a lot. I listened hard, pretending not to, of course. I got tremendously interested. He was saying he had almost made up his mind to go to South America with his Spanish friend, and she showed very plainly that she was afraid to let him go, that she believed he wouldn't come back to her. Then she made it pretty clear that it was the attitude of a person she called 'Charles' which had caused all the trouble. Of course I didn't know who Charles was! But after that she said something which interested me enormously. She described a visit to a crystal-gazer, or a medium of some kind, and she said the woman saw 'Charles' lying ill in bed, with a nurse beside him and a doctor. And who do you think she said the doctor was? Sartorius!"

"You don't mean it!"

"You see, I had just come from Sartorius's house. I had gone there that afternoon to try to get a job. You may imagine how interested I was to find this woman was a patient of the man I expected to work for. And then … I got the idea that both Lady Clifford and the young man seemed disappointed because the medium didn't see anything further, and Captain Holliday was very bitter about it and said that Charles would recover and live to be ninety, which upset the lady very much."

"Do you think at that time…"

"No, I don't. What I believe is that Lady Clifford had no definite determination to do anything until she heard Holliday say he would probably be sailing on the 8th. I think it was the certainty of losing him so soon that drove her to take a positive step. No doubt she knew a good deal about the doctor through Holliday, and how he might be got at through his desire to be free from routine. As for him, human life as such meant nothing whatever to him—I heard him say so. All he cares for is science."

"Do you think Holliday had anything to do with it?" Roger asked tentatively, playing with the window-cord.

"I am fairly sure he hadn't, though he may have suspected something.
At the last he was dragged into it quite against his will, or at least
I got that idea. He was in a blue funk, too—simply dying to clear
out."

"Just the same," remarked Roger rather grimly, "our friend Arthur is not going to be able to skin out of the affair so easily as he thinks. A wireless has already been sent to the boat he sailed on, and when he reaches port he'll be detained and sent back here. In any case, he'll be wanted as an accessory after the act, which may prove an unpleasant business for him…. Go on, though; tell me how you actually came to make up your mind that something was wrong."

"I never did make up my mind until it was too late—that was the awful part! When I think it all over, though, I can see that the thing that most roused my suspicions—not altogether by itself, but taken together with what happened later—was the doctor's flying into a passion with me for mislaying a hypodermic needle. I haven't told you that yet, have I?"

"No. Was it after the injection?"

"It was, and at the very moment when you cut your hand. I put the needle down to attend to you, and I completely forgot where I had laid it. He was fearfully angry, called me names and abused me in a way that got my back up. There seemed no reason for it; I couldn't understand it at all. Then the same day your father got suddenly worse, you remember, and I should have forgotten all about the beast's nasty temper, only…"

"Yes, what happened?"

"Why, quite suddenly, I found the needle! Where do you think? Inside a big book of drawings! I began wondering; I put two and two together…. You see, I didn't dare mention my awful suspicion—I couldn't! It might have ruined me for ever if I was wrong. So I did the only thing I could think of: I took the needle to that chemist and got it analysed. You know all the rest."

"If only you had confided in me, Esther!"

"Even so it was too late to save your father; nothing would have saved him. And you quite understand that if the suspicion had proved unfounded it would have finished me as a nurse for all time!"

He looked at her intently.

"Would that have meant so much to you?"

"Well, what do you think? I've got to earn my living."

"But as far as that goes you might have guessed—that is you might have…"

He broke off as a knock at the door heralded the entrance of a waiter bearing a tray with two frosty cocktails.

"Ah! here's something to put a little colour in your cheeks. You want bucking up, you know! Here's how!"

She took an appreciative sip, then set down her glass, turning on him a slightly troubled face.

"Roger … I suppose if this man is caught, it will mean a trial. I shall be wanted as a witness, sha'n't I? The chief witness, even!"

"Yes, my dear, you will," he replied reluctantly. "I hate the thought of it as much as you do. I wish there were some way to spare you."

"I expect he'll try to prove I'm insane," she said slowly. "Or else that I had some low motive in trying to fasten suspicion on to him. Perhaps he'll even suggest to his lawyer that I was out to blackmail him!"

"Esther, you're frightfully astute to think of such a thing. It's quite on the cards he will do that. He'll use every weapon in his power, unless …"

"Unless what?"

"Well, there's a pretty black lot of evidence against him. ThÉrÈse's death in itself, the way in which she died, was a damaging admission. It seems to me possible that he'll give up the fight entirely. It's hard to predict anything. One doesn't know what cards he has up his sleeve."

Her clouded gaze strayed past him out of the window at the glimmering points of light.

"There is something still so terrifying to me about his machine-like efficiency," she said, "that I can believe him capable of anything. His whole plan was so perfectly thought out, down to the smallest detail. It only broke down through the purely accidental. Once through my losing the needle—though that wasn't so bad as his losing his temper!—and once because he let Holliday give me the injection instead of doing it himself. And yet when I think of what he may say at the trial…"

He leaned forward suddenly and took her two hands in his.

"Esther, listen to me! Will you promise to marry me, at once, before this beastly trial comes on?"

Once again the wave of colour swept over her face. She gave a little nervous laugh.

"But you haven't asked me at all, yet!"

"I'm asking you now. Besides, you knew I meant to. I've been making inquiries this afternoon. There are a lot of formalities that have to be gone through with: we have to see an English solicitor, sign a lot of papers, be affichÉd two Sundays—a sort of banns, you know—and then we have to be married at the mairie. Altogether the business takes just over a couple of weeks, so the sooner one decides the sooner one can set about it, you see?"

She could think of no reply. Her home, her sisters, came into her mind; she stammered, then laughed again with a lump in her throat. Those tears again! She mustn't be so stupid…

There was a sharp rap at the door, more businesslike than the last.

"Who in hell is that?" Roger burst out in irritable annoyance.

It proved to be the valet, obsequious and apologetic, yet full of importance.

"There is a sergent-de-ville to speak with Monsieur," he informed them mysteriously, but with a Frenchman's full appreciation of the ruptured tÊte-À-tÊte.

"I'll have to go, I suppose," Roger informed her. "But I'll get it disposed of as quickly as possible."

Ten minutes went slowly by. She had tried not to let Roger see how much she dreaded the prospect of the witness-box. In her present state of nerves she felt she might be guilty of a hundred contradictions and indiscretions, if faced with the basilisk eyes and over-powering personality of the man she feared. At the very thought of him she began to tremble all over as though with ague. It was perfectly absurd, of course, but there it was. Still now, if she chose, she could face the trying experience as a married woman, as Roger Clifford's wife. That security somehow promised her a new strength. Roger's wife! And in a fortnight's time! A different sort of tremor seized her, a frisson of exquisite joy….

The door opened. Roger came towards her, took her hands again in his, and looked at her closely. She grew apprehensive of what he had to tell her.

"What is it? What has happened?"

"Don't be frightened. They have caught Sartorius. They captured him aboard a fruit-boat in the harbour, about an hour ago. The boat was under sailing orders, bound for a port in Morocco; they think the captain was a friend of Sartorius's. Anyway, they surrounded the doctor in his cabin. He didn't put up any fight—simply looked at them, blew his nose, and followed them up without a word."

She stared at him blankly, wondering what more he had to say.

"Yes—go on. What then?"

"They handcuffed him, of course, and let him sit between two of them in the car. He was quite composed, had nothing to say. It was dark inside the car; they couldn't see him very well. One of the officers thought he leaned against him pretty heavily. When they got to the station he didn't get up, didn't move at all."

"What do you mean?"

"He did us a good turn, Esther. He was quite dead—poisoned, beyond doubt."

"Poisoned! I wonder how he did it?"

"It is amazing, isn't it? It was the stolid calmness of the fellow that put them off, I suppose. They think he must have taken something he had ready when he blew his nose."

She looked at him, her pupils dilated, trying to adjust her ideas to this new development. She felt strangely bewildered.

"It seems so—so stupid! I can't take it in. A clever man like that … first to run away, then to throw up the sponge…"

"I know, that's the way it strikes me, too; he seemed at the last so lacking in resource. Still, he was probably like one of those big, heavy cars that are wonderful on the straight, but can't turn quickly in a sharp corner. Take one of those two-ton Hispano-Switzers——"

"Or the Juggernaut," she suggested slowly.

"By Jove, yes, the Juggernaut … he was like that."

He looked at her with an awful realisation of how near her slender body had come to being ruthlessly crushed by the human machine—simply because it happened to put itself in the path. That he, too, had all unconsciously been in the path and had barely escaped destruction was now of minor importance.

For several seconds Esther stood with her hands against her heart, making an effort to grasp, to envisage, the whole of her strange adventure. Since she had set foot in Cannes two months before she had watched an old man done slowly to death, had saved a life that meant everything to her, and had been directly responsible for the events leading up to two deaths. What a part she had played! She could scarcely take it in….

She came out of her reverie to find herself in Roger's strong arms, his lips warm upon hers. Thought deserted her for a breathless moment.

"Do you know what I'm thinking?" he whispered in what might be termed the first conscious interval. "There may not be any pressing necessity for an immediate wedding, and yet…"

"Yes?" she murmured, her face against his, her heart beating fast.

"Well, a fortnight is a pretty long engagement—at least for me. What do you say?"

Her answer, somewhat muffled, came after a longish pause.

"Since you force me to admit it," she whispered against his neck, "it's quite long enough for me—too!"