Durrance knew at once from the
tone of his voice that suspicion was quieted in him. "I will look out
for Feversham. I remember he was a great friend of yours."
He stretched out his hand towards the matches upon the table beside him.
Durrance heard the scrape of the phosphorus and the flare of the match.
Willoughby was lighting his pipe. It was a well-seasoned piece of briar,
and needed a cleaning; it bubbled as he held the match to the tobacco
and sucked at the mouthpiece.
"Yes, a great friend," said Durrance. "You and I dined with him in his
flat high up above St. James's Park just before we left England."
And at that chance utterance Willoughby's briar pipe ceased suddenly to
bubble. A moment's silence followed, then Willoughby swore violently,
and a second later he stamped upon the carpet. Durrance's imagination
was kindled by this simple sequence of events, and he straightway made
up a little picture in his mind. In one chair himself smoking his cigar,
a round table holding a match-stand on his left hand, and on the other
side of the table Captain Willoughby in another chair. But Captain
Willoughby lighting his pipe and suddenly arrested in the act by a
sentence spoken without significance, Captain Willoughby staring
suspiciously in his slow-witted way at the blind man's face, until the
lighted match, which he had forgotten, burnt down to his fingers, and he
swore and dropped it and stamped it out upon the floor.
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