I suppose I needn't ask you
if you're going back to cane him.'
'Wilderspin did what he did quite unconsciously,' I replied, as I
hailed a hansom. 'It was the finger of God.'
'The finger of--Oh come! That be hanged, old chap.'
'Good-bye,' I said, as I jumped into the hansom.
'But you don't mean to say you are goin' to let a man put your mother
into--'
I heard no more. The terrible idea which had been growing in my
brain, shaping itself out of a nebulous mass of reminiscences of what
had just occurred at the studio, was now stinging me to madness.
Wilderspin's extreme dejection, the strange way in which he had
seemed inclined to evade answering my question as to the safety of
Winifred, the look of pity on his face as at last he answered 'quite
safe'--what did all these indications portend? At every second the
thought grew and grew, till my brain seemed like a vapour of fire,
and my eyeballs seemed to scorch their sockets as I cried aloud:
'Have I found her at last to lose her?'
On reaching the studio door I rapped: before the servant had time to
answer my summons, I rapped again till the sounds echoed along the
street.
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