e on my hand and sickened me.

"Now," said she, "you may as well have the medals as any one else. Take
them and go."

"I don't want them. I only want to get away. I was never mixed up with a
business like this before."

"Nonsense!" said she. "You came for the medals, and here they are at
your mercy. Why should you not have them? There is no one to prevent
you."

I held the bag still in my hand. She opened the case, and between us we
threw a hundred or so of the medals into it. They were all from the one
case, but I could not bring myself to wait for any more. Then I made for
the window, for the very air of this house seemed to poison me after
what I had seen and heard. As I looked back, I saw her standing there,
tall and graceful, with the light in her hand just as I had seen her
first. She waved good-bye, and I waved back at her and sprang out into
the gravel drive.

I thank God that I can lay my hand upon my heart and say that I have
never done a murder, but perhaps it would be different if I had been
able to read that woman's mind and thoughts. There might have been two
bodies in the room instead of one if I could have seen behind that last
smile of hers. But I thought of nothing but of getting safely away, and
it never entered my head how she might be fixing the rope round my neck.
I had not taken five steps out from the window skirting down the shadow
of the house in the way that I had come, when I heard a scream that
might have raised the parish, and then another and another.

"Murder!" she cried. "Murder! Murder! Help!" and her voice rang out in
the quiet of the night-time and sounded over the whole country-side. It
went through my head, that dreadful cry. In an instant lights began to
move and windows to fly up, not only in the house behind me, but at the
lodge and in the stables in front. Like a frightened rabbit I bolted
down the drive, but I heard the clang of the gate being shut before I
could reach it. Then I hid my bag of medals under some dry fagots, and I
tried to get away across the park, but some one saw me in the moonlight,
and presently I had half a dozen of them with dogs upon my heels. I
crouched down among the brambles, but those dogs were too many for me,
and I was glad enough when the men came up and prevented me from being
torn into pieces. They seized me, and dragged me back to the room from
which I had come.

"Is this the man, your Ladyship?" asked the oldest of them--the same
whom I