een
three and four--or shall I come and fetch it, and you?

"As you will.

"Your devoted husband,
"Jean."

He gave her back the letter gravely.

"What was your answer?" he asked.

"I sent nothing," she declared. "I did not reply. But I am
afraid--horribly afraid! He is a terrible man. If we were alone, he
would kill me as you or I would a fly. If only they could have proved
the things at the trial which were known to be true, he would never have
seen the daylight again. But even the witnesses were terrified. They
dared not give evidence against him."

"Will you tell me," Macheson asked, "how it all came about? Not unless
you like," he added, after a moment's hesitation. "Not if it is painful
to you."

She sat down upon the couch, curling herself up at the further end of
it, and building up the pillows at the further end to support her head.
Against the soft green silk, her face was like the face of a tired
child. Something seemed to have gone out of her. She was no longer
playing a part--not even to him--not even to herself. There was nothing
left of the woman of the world. It was the child who told him her story.

"You must listen," she said, "and you may laugh at me if you like, but
you must not be angry. My story is the story of a fool! Sit down,
please--at the end of the couch if you don't mind! I like to have you
between me and the door."

He obeyed her in silence, and she continued. She spoke like a child
repeating her lesson. She held a crumpled-up lace handkerchief in her
hand, and her eyes, large and intent, never left his.

"This is the story of a girl," she said, "an orphan who went abroad
with a chaperon to travel in Europe and perfect her French. In Paris the
chaperon fell ill, the girl hired a guide recommended by the hotel, to
show her the sights.

"They saw all that the tourist sees, and the chaperon was still ill. The
girl thought that she would like to see something of the Parisians
themselves; she was tired of Cook's English people and Americans. So she
gave the guide money to buy himself clothes, and bade him take her to
the restaurants and places where the world of Paris assembled. It was
known at the hotel, perhaps through the servants, that the girl was
rich. The guide heard it and told some one else. Between them they
concocted a plot. The girl was to be the victim. She was only eighteen.

"One day they were lunching at the Ca