“Yes, yes,” said the German uneasily, eyeing her with suspicion and, as she thought, alarm.
“Why trouble you with all that, you will think. We have come into touch with one another in the strangest possible way.”
“It is more than strange, it is monstrous,” put in the doctor angrily. “My young friend, that young clergyman — why, it is absurd! I cannot understand your police, I cannot understand the imbecile witnesses. Never mind — he will be acquitted.”
“Will he?” said Belle. “Funny about the notepaper.”
Dr. Schoppe broke into German in his emphatic assertion of his friend’s innocence, and Belle replied in the same language:
“You can speak German if you like, Dr. Schoppe; I know the language quite well, we had a German governess. I was at school in Switzerland and afterwards in Germany
