"As long as you are not too ferocious," she agreed. "What does my lord wish to know? I shall obey the court in every particular. Who is going to question me--the divisional detective inspector of Grape Street or Harry Labar?" "The divisional detective inspector," he retorted. "What I am anxious to know is what your attitude may be to Adèle Gertstein now? You have run big risks to protect her. Do you still think that she is worth it?" She stiffened a fraction. "She was my friend," she said. "Is she still your friend?" he asked quietly. "You have said as little as possible even now about her--little that I do not know of my own knowledge. And things being as they are, Penelope, if she is still your friend there is only one thing that I can do." "That is?" "To resign from the service, and find some other profession that will enable me to support a wife." Both had come to a halt and she now lifted her grey eyes to his. "I see," she said. Then after a pause: "You mean that as a police officer you will have to go on and arrest her?" "I mean more than that, my dear. I mean that I cannot suppress what I believe to be the important evidence of a vital witness." "However much I begged you?" He put his arm about her. "I am not going to try to persuade you, Penelope, whatever I may think of your scruples. My resignation will go in the moment we get back to London." "Suppose," she asked, softly, "suppose I told you that I felt freed from every obligation to this woman who was my friend? Suppose I told you that I had found her to be as treacherous as a snake, and that I would stamp on her as readily as I would upon a snake? What would you say then?" "I should say that Donna Quixote Penelope had some very good reason. But honestly, dear, I don't want to put you in the witness box unless you wish." She pulled his face down to hers and kissed him. "Thank you. I hate the thought. Still if I am to be a detective's wife I don't want to begin by crossing my husband-to-be. But it will be difficult for me." "I know that. Trust me as far as you can." "That is all the way," she replied. "But if Adèle even at the last had acted in a different way, I might still have hesitated. After all, she is a woman you cannot judge by ordinary standards. She is an impulsive, self-willed child." Labar checked the interruption that there were many criminals like that, and the girl went on. "When she came with Hughes to this place I felt sorry for her, until I knew that she had tried to kill you. I felt sorry for her but relieved to think that I had someone with me to whom I might talk freely. But she was mad with panic. When I suggested that she might give herself up she would not hear of it. She had some wild idea of escaping to South America." "With Larry Hughes?"