‘Poor old Gideon,’ he said.  ’It might have happened, without any intention on his part.  If Hobart found him there with Jane ... and if they quarrelled ...  Gideon’s got a quick temper, and Hobart always made him see red....  He might have hit him—­pushed him down, without meaning to injure him—­and then it would be done.  And then—­if he did it—­he must have left the house at once ... perhaps not knowing he’d killed him.  Perhaps he didn’t know till afterwards.  And then Jane might have asked him not to say anything ...  I don’t know.  I don’t know.  Perhaps it’s nonsense; perhaps it is a tissue of lies.  I hope to God it is....  I only know one thing that makes me even suspect it may be true, and that is that Gideon has been absolutely miserable, and gone about like a man half stunned, ever since it happened. Why?’

He shot the question at me, hoping I had some answer.  But I had none.  I shook my head.

‘Well,’ said Jukie sadly, ’it isn’t, I suppose, our business whether he did or didn’t do it.  That’s between him and—­himself.  But it is our business, whether he’s innocent or guilty, to put him on his guard against this talk.  It’s for you or me to do that, Katherine.  Will you?’

‘If you like.’

’I’d rather you did it, if you will ...  I think he’s less likely to think that you’re trying to find things out....  You see, I warned him once before, about another thing, and he might think I was linking it in my mind with that.’

‘With Jane,’ I said, and he nodded.

’Yes.  With Jane ...  I spoke to him about Jane a few days before it happened.  I thought it might be some use.  But I think it only made things worse....  I’d rather leave this to you, unless you hate it too much....  Oh, it’s all pretty sickening, isn’t it?  Gideon—­Gideon in this sort of mess.  Gideon, the best of the lot of us....  You see, even if it’s all moonshine about Hobart, as I’m quite prepared to believe it probably is, he’s gone and given plausibility to the yarn by falling in love with Hobart’s wife.  Nothing can get round that.  Why couldn’t he have chucked it—­gone away—­anything—­when he felt it coming on?  A strong, fine, keen person like that, to be bowled over by his sloppy emotions and dragged through the mud, like any beastly sensualist, or like one of my own cheery relations....  I’d rather he’d done Hobart in.  There’d have been some sense about that, if he had.  After all, it would have been striking a blow against Potterism.  Only, if he did do it, it would be more like him to face the music and own to it.  What I can’t fit into the picture is Gideon sneaking away in the dark, afraid ...  Oh well, it’s not my business ...  Good-night, Katherine.  You’ll do it at once, won’t you?  Ring him up to-morrow and get him to dine with you or something.  If there’s any way of stopping that poisonous woman’s tongue, we’ll find it....  Meanwhile, I shall tell our parish workers that Leila Yorke’s works are obscene, and that they’re not to read them to mother’s meetings as is their habit.’