Page:Edgar Wallace - The Man who Knew.djvu/301

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THE COMING OF SERGEANT SMITH

the interview to Saul Arthur Mann, described the speech as almost mechanical.

"I hope you are going to take it nicely," she went on, "that we are going to be such good friends as we always were, and that even the memory of your poor uncle's death and the ghastly trial which followed and the part that Jasper played will not spoil our friendship."

"But don't you see what it means to me?" he burst forth, and for a second they looked at one another, and Frank divined her thoughts and winced.

"I know what you are thinking," he said huskily; "you are thinking of all the beastly things that were said at the trial, that if I had gained you I should have gained all that I tried to gain."

She went red.

"It was horrid of me, wasn't it?" she confessed. "And yet that idea came to me. One cannot control one's thoughts, Frank, and you must be content to know that I believe in your innocence. There are some thoughts which

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