. "That
hotel-keeper tried to talk to me once of some girl he had lost, but I
told him I didn't want to hear any of his beastly women stories. It had
something to do with you, had it?"

Heyst looked on serenely at this outburst, then lost his patience a
little.

"What sort of comedy is this? You don't mean to say that you didn't know
that I had--that there was a girl living with me here?"

One could see that the eyes of Mr. Jones had become fixed in the depths
of their black holes by the gleam of white becoming steady there. The
whole man seemed frozen still.

"Here! Here!" he screamed out twice. There was no mistaking his
astonishment, his shocked incredulity--something like frightened
disgust.

Heyst was disgusted also, but in another way. He too was incredulous.
He regretted having mentioned the girl; but the thing was done, his
repugnance had been overcome in the heat of his argument against the
absurd bandit.

"Is it possible that you didn't know of that significant fact?" he
inquired. "Of the only effective truth in the welter of silly lies that
deceived you so easily?"

"No, I didn't!" Mr. Jones shouted. "But Martin did!" he added in a faint
whisper, which Heyst's ears just caught and no more.

"I kept her out of sight as long as I could," said Heyst. "Perhaps, with
your bringing up traditions, and so on; you will understand my reason
for it."

"He knew. He knew before!" Mr. Jones mourned in a hollow voice. "He knew
of her from the first!"

Backed hard against the wall he no longer watched Heyst. He had the air
of a man who had seen an abyss yawning under his feet.

"If I want to kill him, this is my time," thought Heyst; but he did not
move.

Next moment Mr. Jones jerked his head up, glaring with sardonic fury.

"I have a good mind to shoot you, you woman-ridden hermit, you man in
the moon, that can't exist without--no, it won't be you that I'll shoot.
It's the other woman-lover--the prevaricating, sly, low-class, amorous
cuss! And he shaved--shaved under my very nose. I'll shoot him!"

"He's gone mad," thought Heyst, startled by the spectre's sudden fury.

He felt himself more in danger, nearer death, than ever since he had
entered that room. An insane bandit is a deadly combination. He did not,
could not know that Mr. Jones was quick-minded enough to see already the
end of his reign over his excellent secretary's thoughts and feelings;
the coming failure of Ricardo's fidelity. A woman had i