CHAPTER 24For several moments Mr. Pinkerton thought Inspector Bull could not have heard what he had said. He simply stood there, on his way to the door, for a very long time. Then, with equal silence, he moved slowly back and stood between the wretched little man, clutching desperately at his bed-clothes, and the fire, still looking at him. Then, at long last, he sat down on the oak settle.
“What were you doing out there, Pinkerton?” he asked.
There was a superhuman mildness in his voice that fooled Mr. Pinkerton not at all.
“I was . . . investigating,” Mr. Pinkerton managed to say, incoherently.
Inspector Bull was silent again. He said, after some time, “What did you find out, if anything?”
Mr. Pinkerton moistened his lips once more, and gripped firmly at the bedclothes to keep his h
