Page:Richard Marsh--The goddess a demon.djvu/139

Rh He went to the other side of the bed, and replaced the sheet over the dead man's head and face. The policeman put in his word.

"I beg your pardon, sir, but she's been behaving in the most extraordinary manner in the other room. It seems, from what she's been saying, and doing, that she was there when the gentleman was being murdered, and she's been acting it all over to herself again as it were. Struck him with a great knife, she said she did."

"You heard her admit that she struck him with a knife?"

"I did—more than once; and these two gentlemen, and that lady heard her, too. She said that she meant to kill him all along; and then she said she struck him in the back with a great knife, and he fell forward on his face; and she acted how she struck him, and how he fell."

"In face of that statement my duty's plain; the lady must be detained."

He was going on, but I cut him short.

"Then I say that the lady shall not be detained; I will save you, Mr. Symonds, from making one of the most serious mistakes you ever made in your life. Miss Adair, escort the lady from the room. I will see that no one touches her. Now, constable, out of the way."

I moved towards the policeman, who did not