"You mean----" He felt for the tree trunk as if dizzy.

"Yes. She has found out----"

"What--how--when?" His words came in gasps of fear.

"About us----"

"How?"

"It was mammy. She was wild with jealousy that I had taken her place and was allowed to sleep in the house. She got to slipping to the nursery at night and watching me. She must have seen me one night at your room door and told her to get rid of me."

The man suddenly gripped the girl's shoulders, swung her face toward him and gazed into her shifting eyes, while his breath came in labored gasps:

"You little yellow devil! Mammy never told that to my wife and you know it; she would have told me and I would have sent you away. She knows that story would kill my baby's mother and she'd have cut the tongue out of her own head sooner than betray me. She has always loved me as her own child--she'd fight for me and die for me and stand for me against every man, woman and child on earth!"

"Well, she told her," the girl sullenly repeated.

"Told her what?" he asked.

"That I was hanging around your room." She paused.

"Well, go on----"

"Miss Jean asked me if it was true. I saw that we were caught and I just confessed the whole thing----"

The man sprang at her throat, paused, and his hands fell limp by his side.

He gazed at her a moment, and grasped her wrists with cruel force:

"Yes, that's it, you little fiend--you confessed! You were so afraid you might not be forced to confess that you went out of your way to tell it.

Two months ago I came to my senses and put you out of my life. You deliberately tried to commit murder to bring me back. You knew that confession would kill my wife as surely as if you had plunged a knife into her heart. You know that she has the mind of an innocent child--that she can think no evil of any one. You've tried to kill her on purpose, willfully, maliciously, deliberately--and if she dies----"

Norton's voice choked into an inarticulate groan and the girl smiled calmly.

The band in the Hall over their heads ended the music in a triumphant crash and he listened mechanically to the chairman while he announced the temporary absence of the guest of honor:

"And while he is out of the Hall for a few minutes, ladies and gentlemen,"

he added facetiously, "we can say a lot of fine things behind his back we would have blushed to tell him to his face----"

Another burst of applause and the hum and chatter and laughter came through the open window.

With a cry of anguish, the man turned again on the girl:

"Why do you stand there grinning at me? Why did you do this fiendish thing?

What have you to say?"

"Nothing"--there was a ring of exultation in her voice--"I did it because I had to."

Norton leaned against the oak, placed his hands on his temples and groaned:

"Oh, my G.o.d! It's a nightmare----"

Suddenly he asked:

"What did she do when you told her?"

The girl answered with indifference:

"Screamed, called me a liar, jumped on me like a wild-cat, dug her nails in my neck and went into hysterics."

"And you?"

"I picked her up, carried her to bed and sent for the doctor. As quick as he came I ran here to tell you."

The speaker upstairs was again announcing his name as the next Governor and Senator and the crowd were cheering. He felt the waves of Death roll over and engulf him. His knees grew weak and in spite of all effort he sank to a stone that lay against the gnarled trunk of the tree.

"She may be dead now," he said to himself in a dazed whisper.

"I don't think so!" the soft voice purred with the slightest suggestion of a sneer. She bit her lips and actually laughed. It was more than he could bear. With a sudden leap his hands closed on her throat and forced her trembling form back into the shadows.

"May--G.o.d--hurl--you--into--everlasting--h.e.l.l--for--this!" he cried in anguish and his grip suddenly relaxed.

The girl had not struggled. Her own hand had simply been raised instinctively and grasped his.

"What shall I do?" she asked.

"Get out of my sight before I kill you!"

"I'm not afraid."

The calm accents maddened him to uncontrollable fury:

"And if you ever put your foot into my house again or cross my path, I'll not be responsible for what happens!"

His face was livid and his fists closed with an unconscious strength that cut the blood from the palms of his hands.

"I'm not afraid!" she repeated, her voice rising with clear a.s.surance, a strange smile playing about her full lips.

"Go!" he said fiercely.

The girl turned without a word and walked into the bright light that streamed from the windows of the banquet hall, paused and looked at him, the white rows of teeth shining with a smile:

"But I'll see you again!"

And then, with shouts of triumph mocking his soul, his shoulders drooped, drunk with the stupor and pain of shame, he walked blindly through the night to the Judgment Bar of Life--a home where a sobbing wife waited for his coming.