Hangmans Holiday by Dorothy L. Sayers

it less. There was a time, I think, Langley, when you would have jumped at the idea of living alone with— my wife.”
    Langley jumped up.
    “What the devil are you insinuating, Wetherall?”
    “Nothing, nothing. I was just thinking of the afternoon when you and she wandered away at a picnic and got lost. You remember? Yes, I thought you would.”
    “This is monstrous,” retorted Langley. “How dare you say such things—with that poor soul sitting there—?”
    “Yes, poor soul. You’re a poor thing to look at now, aren’t you, my kitten?”
    He turned suddenly to the woman. Something in his abrupt gesture seemed to frighten her, and she shrank away from him.
    “You devil!” cried Langley. “She’s afraid of you. What have you been doing to her? How did she get into this state? I will know!”
    “Gently,” said Wetherall. “I can allow for your natural agitation at finding her like this, but I can’t have your coming between me and my wife. What a faithful fellow you are, Langley. I believe you still want her—just as you did before when you thought I was dumb and blind. Come now, have you got designs of my wife, Langley? Would you like to kiss her, caress her, take her to bed with you—my beautiful wife?”
    A scarlet fury blinded Langley. He dashed an inexpert fist at the mocking face. Wetherall gripped his arm, but he broke away. Panic seized him. He fled stumbling against the furniture and rushed out. As he went he heard Wetherall very softly laughing.
    The train to Paris was crowded. Langley, scrambling in at the last moment, found himself condemned to the corridor. He sat down on a suitcase and tried to think. He had not been able to collect his thoughts on his wild flight. Even now, he was not quite sure what he had fled from. He buried his head in his hands.
    “Excuse me,” said a polite voice.
    Langley looked up. A fair man in a grey suit was looking down at him through a monocle.
    “Fearfully sorry to disturb you,” went on the fair man. “I’m just tryin’ to barge back to my jolly old kennel. Ghastly crowd, isn’t it? Don’t know when I’ve disliked my fellow-creatures more. I say, you don’t look frightfully fit. Wouldn’t you be better on something more comfortable?”
    Langley explained that he had not been able to get a seat. The fair man eyed his haggard and unshaven countenance for a moment and then said:
    “Well, look here, why not come and lay yourself down in my bin for a bit? Have you had any grub? No? That’s a mistake. Toddle along with me and we’ll get hold of a spot of soup and so on. You’ll excuse me mentioning it, but you look as if you’d been backing a system that’s come unstuck, or something. Not my business, of course, but do have something to eat.”
    Langley was too faint and sick to protest. He stumbled obediently along the corridor till he was pushed into a first-class sleeper, where a rigidly correct manservant was laying out a pair of mauve silk pyjamas and a set of silver-mounted brushes.
    “This gentleman’s feeling rotten, Bunter,” said the man with the monocle, “so I’ve brought him in to rest his aching head upon thy breast. Get hold of the commissariat and tell ’em to buzz a plate of soup along and a bottle of something drinkable.”
    “Very good, my lord.”
    Langley dropped, exhausted, on the bed, but when the food appeared he ate and drank greedily. He could not remember when he had last made a meal.
    “I say,” he said, “I wanted that. It’s awfully decent of you. I’m sorry to appear so stupid. I’ve had a bit of a shock.”
    “Tell me all,” said the stranger pleasantly.
    The man did not look particularly intelligent, but he seemed friendly, and above all, normal. Langley wondered how the story would sound.
    “I’m an absolute stranger to you,” he began.
    “And I to you,” said the fair man. “The chief use of strangers is to tell things to. Don’t you agree?”
    “I’d like—” said Langley. “The fact