“You’re a strange man and I have listened to you from simple curiosity. But I have admitted nothing, remember that!”

“Oh, I know that, I’ll remember. Look at him, he’s trembling! Don’t be uneasy, my dear fellow, have it your own way. Walk about a bit, you won’t be able to walk too far. If anything happens, I have one request to make of you,” he added, dropping his voice. “It’s an awkward one, but important. If anything were to happen (though indeed I don’t believe in it and think you quite incapable of it), yet in case you were taken during these forty or fifty hours with the notion of putting an end to the business in some other way, in some fantastic fashion — laying hands on yourself — (it’s an absurd proposition, but