On the contrary, I had picked up the mate of it very near where you found yours, and I wanted to know to whom it belonged.

For I don't mind telling you now, Collinson, that I believe there WAS a woman in that house, and the same woman whose face I saw at the window.

You remember how the boys joked me about it--well, perhaps I didn't care that you should laugh at me too, but I've had a sore conscience over my lie, for I remembered that you seemed to have some interest in the matter too, and I thought that maybe I might have thrown you off the scent.

It seemed to me that if you had any idea who it was, we might now talk the matter over and compare notes.

I think you said--at least, I gathered the idea from a remark of yours," he added hastily, as he remembered that the suggestion was his own, and a satirical one--"that it reminded you of your wife's slipper.