Page:The Valley of Fear.pdf/98

Rh Holmes,” he answered after a pause. “The candle threw a very bad light. My first thought was to get a better one. The lamp was on the table; so I lit it.”

“And blew out the candle?”

“Exactly.”

Holmes asked no further question, and Barker, with a deliberate look from one to the other of us, which had, as it seemed to me, something of defiance in it, turned and left the room.

Inspector MacDonald had sent up a note to the effect that he would wait upon Mrs. Douglas in her room; but she had replied that she would meet us in the dining room. She entered now, a tall and beautiful woman of thirty, reserved and self-possessed to a remarkable degree, very different from the tragic and distracted figure I had pictured. It is true that her face was pale and drawn, like that of one who has endured a great shock; but her manner was composed, and the finely molded hand which she rested upon the edge of the table was as steady as my own. Her sad, appealing eyes traveled from one to the other of us with a curiously inquisitive expres- [96]