"No; for there's nothing to cast a shadow."
"Is there not?" said Thresk, with a queer smile. "That's where you make your mistake. Aren't you conscious of something very strange, very insidious, close by us in this room?"
"I am aware that you are frightening Mrs. Thresk," said Glynn roughly; and, indeed, standing by the table, with her white face and her bosom heaving under her hand, she looked the very embodiment of terror. Thresk turned at once to her. A look of solicitude made his gross face quite tender. He took her by the arm, and in a chiding, affectionate tone he said very gently:
"You are not frightened, Linda, are you? Interested--yes, just as I am. But not frightened. There's nothing to be frightened at. We are not children."
"Oh, Jim," she said, and she leaned upon his arm. He led her across to the sofa, and sat down beside her.
"That's right. Now we are comfortable." But the last word was not completed. It seemed that it froze upon his lips. He stopped, looked for a second into space, and then, dropping his arm from about his wife's waist, he deliberately moved aside from her, and made a space between them.
"Now we are in our proper places--the four of us," he said bitterly,
"The three of us," Glynn corrected, as he walked round the table. "Where's the fourth?"
And then there came to him this extraordinary answer given in the quietest voice imaginable.
"Between my wife and me. Where should he be?"
Glynn stared. There was no one in the room but Linda, Thresk, and himself--no one. But--but--it was the loneliness of the spot, and its silence, and its great distance from his world, no doubt, which troubled him. Thresk's manner, too, and his words were having their effect. That was all, Glynn declared stoutly to himself. But--but--he did not wonder that Linda had written so urgently for him to come to her. His back went cold, and the hair stirred upon his scalp.
Linda rose from the sofa, and took a quick step towards him.. Her eyes implored him to silence.
"There is no one," she protested in a low voice.
"No," cried Glynn loudly. "Let us understand what wild fancy he has! Who is the fourth?"
Upon Thresk's face came a look of sullenness.
"Channing," said Thresk. "Mildmay Channing." He sat for a while, brooding with his head sunk upon his breast. And Glynn started back. Some vague recollection was stirring in his memory. There had been a story current amongst Linda's friends at the time of her marriage. She had been in love with Channing, desperately in love with him. The marriage with Thresk had been forced on her by her parents--yes, and by Thresk's persistency. It had been a civilised imitation of the Rape of the Sabine Women. That was how the story ran, Glynn remembered. He waited to hear more from James Thresk, and in a moment the words came, but in a thoroughly injured tone.
