I was still thinking of it when I came face to face with Roger Ackroyd.

 

“Sheppard!” he exclaimed. “Just the man I wanted to get hold of. This is a

terrible business.”

 

“You’ve heard then?”

 

He nodded. He had felt the blow keenly, I could see. His big red cheeks seemed

to have fallen in, and he looked a positive wreck of his usual jolly, healthy

self.

 

“It’s worse than you know,” he said quietly. “Look here, Sheppard, I’ve got to

talk to you. Can you come back with me now?”

 

“Hardly. I’ve got three patients to see still, and I must be back by twelve to

see my surgery patients.”

 

“Then this afternoon—no, better still, dine to-night. At 7.30? Will that suit

you?”

 

“Yes—I can manage that all right. What’s wrong? Is it Ralph?”

 

I hardly knew why I said that—except, perhaps, that it had so often been Ralph.

 

Ackroyd stared blankly at me as though he hardly understood. I began to realize