“I don’t believe it, Bobby.  I’ll never believe it no matter what happens.”

“It’s sweet of you, Katherine,” he said huskily.  “That helps when you don’t know what to believe yourself.”

“Don’t talk that way.  Such a crime would never have entered your head under any conditions.  Only, Bobby, it ought never to have happened.  You ought never to have been in this position.  Why have you been friendly with people like—­like that Spaniard?  What can he want, forcing himself here?  At any rate, you’ll never lead that sort of life again?”

Her fingers sought his.  He clasped them firmly.

“If I get past this,” he said, “I’ll always look you straight in the eye, Katherine.  It was mad—­silly.  You don’t quite understand—­”

He broke off, glancing at the door through which Graham had disappeared.

“Then remember,” she said softly, “I don’t believe it.”

She released his hand, sighing.

“That’s all I can say, all I can do now.  You’re ill, Bobby.  Go in.  Rest for awhile.  When you’ve had sleep you may remember something.”

He shook his head.  He walked slowly with her to the house.

As he climbed the stairs he heard Paredes telephoning.  He couldn’t understand the man’s insistence on remaining where clearly he was an intruder.

He entered his bedroom which he had occupied only once or twice during the last few months.  The place seemed unfamiliar.  As he bathed and dressed his sense of strangeness grew, and he understood why.  The last time he had been here he had stood in no personal danger.  There had been no black parenthesis in his life during the stretch of which he might have committed an unspeakable crime.  For he couldn’t believe as firmly as Katherine did.  Since he couldn’t remember, he might have done anything.

“Come!” he called in response to a stealthy rapping at the door.

Stealth, it occurred to him, had, since last night, become a stern condition of his life.

Graham entered and noiselessly closed the door.

“I had a chance to slip in,” he explained.  “Paredes is wandering about the place.  I’d give a lot to know what he’s after at the Cedars.  Katherine is in her room, trying to rest after last night, I fancy.”

“And,” Bobby asked, “the detective—­Howells?”

“If he’s back from the station,” Graham answered, “he’s keeping low.  I wonder if it was he or Paredes who followed you through the woods?”

“Why should Carlos have followed me?” Bobby asked.  “I’ve been thinking it over, Hartley.  It isn’t a bad scheme having him here, since you think he hasn’t told all he knows.”

“I don’t say that,” Graham answered.  “I don’t know what to think about Paredes.  I’ve come to talk about just that.  I’m a lawyer, and I’ve had some criminal practice.  Since this detective will be satisfied with you for a victim, I’m going to take your case, if you’ll have me.  I’ll be your detective as well as your lawyer.”