The whole business was, in the opinion of Theodore Smythe, worthy the shady character of his wife's undesirable connection. Out of a feeling of delicacy he kept the verbal expression of his views from her. He did his utmost to console her; for she was not only inexpressibly shocked, but acutely alive to the danger of Van Bleit's position. He even promised to secure for his defence the best services that money could procure. But he entertained no great belief that Karl would get out of the present mess. He had been extraordinarily lucky hitherto through a career of suspected crime; nothing beyond suspicion had clung to him; but it seemed as though this time at least the law had got its iron grip on him and would not be likely to let go. Putting his wife's feelings out of the question, Smythe had a distinct dislike to the idea of a connection of his own suffering the penalty of the law. "It's such a beastly low-down, undignified position," he complained. Mrs Lawless read the news while she lingered over her breakfast. The midnight tragedy had already been seized upon to fill a column of the daily paper. Her face turned paler as she read, and the hand that held the newspaper was not quite steady. When she had read to the last line she laid the paper down beside her plate and sat staring out at the sunshine with wide startled eyes... Murder! ... There was something terrible in the mere sight of the word in print--something horribly revolting. Could it be possible that this man with whom she had talked so often, who had touched her with his hands, was guilty of this foul crime? She shivered at the mere remembrance that only the night before he had held her hand and touched it with his lips. He had parted from her and had gone straightway and done this thing... What violent deeds men who engage in desperate ventures will commit! She rose from the table, and leaving her unfinished breakfast, went out into the garden. The news had shocked her. She looked like a woman who is frightened and at the same time infinitely relieved. As she paced up and down beneath the trees that cast their pleasant shade upon the path, one thought kept beating upon her brain with an insistence that drove out every other thought and lulled a long-endured pain at her heart like some blessed anodyne. She smiled as she looked up into the green tracery above her head. "If she by her evil influence over him has saved him from danger," her thought ran, "then I am grateful to her for coming into his life." And so she put behind her her jealousy of the woman who for the present dominated Lawless' life. Later in the morning Mrs Lawless ordered the car and drove into Cape Town to call on her friend.