Thresk had the lawyer's mind or rather the mind of a lawyer in big practice.

He had the instinct for the essential fact and the knowledge that it was most lucid when presented in a naked simplicity.

He was at pains to set before Jane Repton what he had seen of the life which Stella lived with Stephen Ballantyne and nothing else.
"Now," he said when he had finished, "you sent me to Chitipur.

I must know why." And when she hesitated he overbore her.
"You can be guilty of no disloyalty to your friend," he insisted, "by being frank with me.

After all I have given guarantees.