The pyschology of crime is a curious and surprising study, Mr.Pettifer, but I know of no case where terror has acted as a sleeping-draught." Mr.Pettifer smiled and turned altogether away from the question.
"It is, as I said, a minor point, and perhaps one from which any sort of inference would be unsafe.

It interested me.

I lay no great stress upon it." He dismissed the point carelessly, to the momentary amusement of Henry Thresk.

The art of slipping away from defeat had been practised with greater skill.

Thresk lost some part of his apprehension but none of his watchfulness.
"Now, however, we come to something very different," said Pettifer, hitching himself a little closer to his table and fixing his eyes upon Thresk.