He would have slid out again, or at least he made a semblance of wishing to slide out, though in reality his eyes were full of curiosity respecting John’s friends, who on their side gazed at him with an almost ludicrous dismay. This, at least, was the feeling of Mrs. Egerton, who stood with a helpless gasp of incredulity and amazement gazing at this criminal, this untragical, unterrible apparition of whom she had been thinking a moment before with horror in which no mitigating circumstance had any part. ‘I did not think,’ said the culprit, with his deprecating look, ‘that you would have been at home at this hour. I thought I would find the room empty when I got here. I had these back from Spender & Diggs last night. I intended only to leave them--not to disturb you among your friends.’ John’s mouth was so dry that he could scarcely speak. He took May by the arm and almost forced him into a chair. ‘I did not seek you,’ he said, ‘God knows. It would be better for us if you had been dead as I thought. But you cannot go away now on any pretext of disowning who you are. This is my father, Mrs. Egerton. I have told you who he is and what he is--there’s no more to say. As for Miss--as for--for Elly---- Oh, my God!’ He stood holding his father by the arm, but with the other hand he covered his face. Such a cry of anguish could find no words except in the inevitable universal appeal which human nature takes its final refuge in, whatever its misery may be. Even at this moment, however, the comic element, which mixes with almost every tragedy, came in when it ought least to have shown itself. May struggled against the detaining hold with a look of injured amiability and innocent amazement. ‘I’m not used to be kept by force,’ he said, turning to the elder lady with that look of taking her into his confidence. ‘He grips me like--like a policeman. I don’t know what he wants to do with me: to expose me to ladies who don’t know me: to make you think---- If I’ve made a mistake, why, there’s your papers again, and all’s right between us. Let me go.’ Elly stole round to the other side of the prisoner’s chair. ‘Oh, sir,’ she said, ‘I don’t know who you are: but you must stay if Jack wishes you to stay. He is unhappy, do not cross him now. If you are his father, we are your friends as well as his.’ May’s countenance changed. He looked at her with an anxious, furtive pucker of his eyelids. ‘Young lady,’ he said, ‘who are you? are you--Susie?’ with a shade of sudden gravity on his face. ‘No,’ said Elly, casting at John a glance of radiant defiance, unable even at that moment to take his rejection seriously. ‘I am--engaged to Jack.’ The man who had brought such dismay and misery with him had no lively sense of shame, but he had occasional perceptions as keen as they were evanescent. He looked for a moment at the group round him, and divined all it meant. It was not easy for the quickest wit to find a remedy.