Neville, pale and silent, raised his eyes: 

“Do you suspect anybody?”

“I don’t know,” said the doctor carelessly;—­“I’ll just step over to the telephone and make an inquiry of Penrhyn Cardemon—­”

He walked to the end of the big hall, unhooked the receiver, asked for
Cardemon’s house, got it.

Neville heard him say: 

“This is Dr. Ogilvy.  Is that you, Gelett?  Isn’t your master at home?”

* * * * *

“What?  Had to catch a train?”

* * * * *

“Oh!  A sudden matter of business.”

* * * * *

“I see.  He’s had a cable calling him to London.  How long will he be away, Gelett?”

* * * * *

“Oh, I see.  You don’t know.  Very well.  I only called up because I understood he required medical attention.”

* * * * *

“Yes—­I understood he’d been hurt about the head and face, but I didn’t know he had received such a—­battering.”

* * * * *

“You say that his horse threw him in the big beech-woods?  Was he really very much cut up?”

* * * * *

“Pretty roughly handled, eh!  All right.  When you communicate with him tell him that Dr. Ogilvy and Mr. Neville, Jr., were greatly interested to know how badly he was injured.  Do you understand?  Well, don’t forget.  And you may tell him, Gelett, that as long as the scars remain, he’d better remain, too.  Get it straight, Gelett; tell him it’s my medical advice to remain away as long as he can—­and a little longer.  This climate is no good for him.  Good-bye.”

He turned from the telephone and sauntered toward Neville, who regarded him with a fixed stare.

“You see,” he remarked with a shrug; and drew from his pocket a slightly twisted scarf pin—­a big horse-shoe set with sapphires and diamonds—­the kind of pin some kinds of men use in their riding-stocks.

“I’ve often seen him wearing it,” he said carelessly.  “Curious how it could have become twisted and entangled in Miss West’s lace waist.”

He held out the pin, turning it over reflectively as the facets of the gems caught and flashed back the light from the hall brackets.

“I’ll drop it into the poor-box I think,” he mused.  “Cardemon will remain away so long that this pin will be entirely out of fashion when he returns.”

After a few moments Neville drew a long, deep breath, and his clenched hands relaxed.

“Sure,” commented the burly doctor.  “That’s right—­feeling better—­rush of common sense to the head.  Well, I’ve got to go.”

“Will you be here in the morning?”

“I think not.  She’ll be all right.  If she isn’t, send over for me.”

“You don’t think that the shock—­the exhaustion—­”