Dressed in a pale grey gown, relieved with lace at the collar and wrists, she rose slowly from a big armchair as I entered, and came across to me, her face pale, drawn, and anxious.
"Ah! dearest," I cried. "I"m glad to see you better. Are you quite yourself again now?"
"Quite, thanks," was her low, rather weak reply. "I--I felt very unwell this morning. I--I don"t know what was the matter." Then clinging to me suddenly, she added, "Ah! forgive me, Teddy, won"t you?"
"There is nothing to forgive, dear," was my reply, as, placing my arm tenderly about her slim waist, I looked into the depths of those wonderful dark eyes of hers, trying to fathom what secret lay hidden there.
"Ah!" she e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "I know, dear, that though you affect to have forgiven me--that you have not. How could you possibly forgive?"
"I am not angry with you in the least, Phrida!" I a.s.sured her quite calmly. "Because you have not yet told me the truth. I am here to learn it."
"Yes," she gasped, sinking into a chair and staring straight into the fire. The short winter"s day was dying, and already the light had nearly faded. But the fire threw a mellow glow upon her pale, hard-set features, and she presented a strangely dramatic picture as she sat there with head bent in shame. "Ah! yes. You are here again to torture me, I suppose,"
she sighed bitterly.
"I have no desire in the least to torture you," I said, standing erect before her. "But I certainly think that some explanation of your conduct is due to me--the man whom you are to marry."
"Marry!" she echoed in a blank voice, with a shrug of her shoulders, her eyes still fixed upon the fire.
"Yes, marry," I repeated. "You made an admission to me this morning--one of which any man would in such circ.u.mstances demand explanation. You said that my friend had forced you to go to Harrington Gardens. Tell me why?
What power does that man hold over you?"
"Ah, no! Teddy!" she cried, starting wildly to her feet. "No, no!" she protested, grasping my hands frantically. "Don"t ask that question. Spare me that! Spare me that, for the sake of the love you once bore for me."
"No. I repeat my question," I said slowly, but very determinedly.
"Ah! no. I--I can"t answer it. I----"
For a few moments a silence fell between us.
Then I said in a low, meaning tone:
"You can"t answer it, Phrida, because you are ashamed, eh?"
She sprang upon me in an instant, her face full of resentful fire.
"No!" she declared vehemently. "I am not ashamed--only I--I cannot tell you the reason I went to Harrington Gardens. That"s all."
"Yours is, to say the least, a rather thin excuse, is it not?" I asked.
"What else can I say? Simply I can tell you nothing."
"But you admit that you went to Harrington Gardens. Did you go more than once?" I asked very quietly.
She nodded in the affirmative.
"And the last occasion was on the night when my friend was forced to fly, eh?" I suggested.
I saw that she was about to elude answering my question. Therefore, I added:
"I already know you were there. I have established your presence beyond the shadow of doubt. So you may just as well admit it."
"I--I do," she faltered, sinking again into her chair and resting her elbows upon her knees.
"You were there--you were present when the crime was committed," I said, looking straight at her as I stood before her with folded arms.
"Whoever has said that tells wicked lies," was her quick response.
"You were in Digby"s room that night--after I left," I declared.
"How do you know."
"Because the police have photographs of your finger-prints," was my quiet reply.
The effect of my words upon her was electrical.
"The police!" she gasped, her face instantly pale as death. "Do they know?"
"Inspector Edwards is in possession of your finger-prints," I replied briefly.
"Then--then they will suspect me!" she shrieked in despair. "Ah! Teddy!
If you love me, save me!"
And she flung herself wildly at my feet, clutching my hands and raising her face to mine in frantic appeal.
"For that very reason I have returned here to you to-day, Phrida," I replied in a low tone of sympathy. "If I can save you from being implicated in this terrible affair, I will. But you must tell me the whole truth from the start. Then I may be able to devise a plan to ensure your security."
And I slowly a.s.sisted her to her feet and led her back to her chair.
She sat without moving or speaking for some moments, gravely thinking.
Then of a sudden, she said in a hard, hoa.r.s.e voice:
"Ah! you don"t know, Teddy, what I have suffered--how I have been the innocent victim of a foul and dastardly plot. I--I was entrapped--I----"
"Entrapped!" I echoed. "By whom? Not by Digby Kemsley? He was not the sort of man."
"He is your friend, I know. But if you knew the truth you would hate him--hate him, with as deep and fierce a hatred as I do now," she declared, with a strange look in her great eyes.
"You told me he had forced you to go to his flat."
"He did."
"Why?"
"Because he wanted to tell me something--to----"
"To tell you what?"
"I refuse to explain--I can"t tell you, Teddy."