"In that case it is no use my urging you further." Mr. Oakham spoke stiffly, and put his eye-glasses in his pocket with an air of vexation. "Mr. Colwyn has something to say to you on the subject. Perhaps you will listen to him. He believes he can help you." "He helped to arrest me," said Penreath, with a slight indifferent look at the detective. "But not to convict you," said Colwyn. "I had hoped to help you." "What do you want of me?" Penreath's tone was cold. "In the first place, I have to say that I believe you innocent." The young man lifted his eyebrows slightly, as if to indicate that the other's opinion was a matter of indifference to him, but he remained silent. "I have come to beg of you, even at this late hour, to break your silence, and give an account of your actions that night at the inn." "You might have saved yourself the trouble of coming here. I have nothing whatever to say." "That means that you continue in your refusal to speak. Will you answer one or two questions?" "No." "Will you not tell me why you kept silence about what you saw in Mr. Glenthorpe's room that night of the murder?" "Man, how did you find that out?" Penreath's calm disappeared in a sudden fury of voice and look. "What do you know?" "I know whom you are trying to shield," replied the detective, with his eyes fixed on Penreath's face. "You are wrong. She----" "I beg of you to be silent! Do not mention names, for God's sake." Penreath's face had grown suddenly white. "It is in your power to ensure my silence." "How?" "By speaking yourself." "That I will never do." "Then you compel me to go to the authorities and tell them what I have discovered. I will save you in spite of yourself." "Do you think that I want to be saved--like that?" Struggling desperately for self-control Penreath turned to Mr. Oakham. "Why did you bring Mr. Colwyn here?" he asked the solicitor fiercely. "To torture me?" Before Mr. Oakham could reply Colwyn laughed aloud. A clear ringing laugh of unmistakable satisfaction. The laugh sounded strangely incongruous in such a place. "Penreath," he said, "you've told me all that I came here to know. You're a splendid young Briton, but finesse is not your strong point. You've acted like a quixotic young idiot in this case, and got yourself into a nice muddle for nothing. The girl is as innocent as you are, and you are a pair of simpletons! Yes. I mean what I say," continued the detective, answering the young man's amazed look with a reassuring smile. "Do you think that I would want to save you at her expense? Now perhaps, when I have told you what happened that night, you will answer a few questions. Before you went to bed you sat down and wrote a letter on a leaf torn from your pocket-book. That letter was to Miss Willoughby, breaking off your engagement. After writing it you went to bed. At that time it was raining hard.