ite. Otherwise, I'm
afraid there isn't much hope."

"As I said, that doesn't become my property until late spring, nearly
summer, in fact."

"That is time enough. We are hoping to be able to bid for the railroad
contract. I believe it calls for the first shipment of ties about June
first. That would give us plenty of time. If we had your word, we
could go ahead, assemble the necessary machinery, snake a certain
amount of logs down through the snow this winter and be in readiness
when the right moment came. Without it, however, we can hardly hope
for a sufficient supply to carry us through. And so--"

"You want to know--about heem. You have Ba'teese's word----"

"Really--" she seemed to be fencing again.

Houston, with a hard pull at his breath, came directly to the question.

"It's simply this, Miss Robinette. If I am guilty of those things, you
don't want to have anything to do with me, and I don't want you to.
But I am here to tell you that I am not guilty, and that it all has
been a horrible blunder of circumstance. It is very true in one
sense--" and his voice lowered--"that about two years ago in Boston, I
was arrested and tried for murder."

"So Mr. Thayer said."

"I was acquitted--but not for the reason Thayer gave. They couldn't
make a case, they failed absolutely to prove a thing which, had I
really been guilty, should have been a simple matter. A worthless
cousin, Tom Langdon, was the man who was murdered. They said I did it
with a wooden mallet which I had taken from a prize fight, and which
had been used to hammer on the gong for the beginning and the end of
the rounds. I had been seen to take it from the fight, and it was
found the next morning beside Langdon. There was human blood on it. I
had been the last person seen with Langdon. They put two and two
together--and tried to convict me on circumstantial evidence. But they
couldn't convince the jury; I went free, as I should have done. I was
innocent!"

Houston, white now with the memories and with the necessity of
retailing again in the presence of a girl who, to him, stood for all
that could mean happiness, gritted his teeth for the determination to
go on with the grisly thing, to hide nothing in the answers to the
questions which she might ask. But Medaine Robinette, standing beside
the window, the color gone from her cheeks, one hand lingering the
curtains, eyes turned without, gave no evidence that she had heard.
Ba'tis