ndsome man,
a friend of mine until I knew the truth about him, and then he died--I
killed him, so the court said."

Her face became ghastly pale. After a moment of anguished bewilderment,
she said: "You mean that Erris Boyne was my father?"

"Yes, I mean that. They say I killed him. They say that he was found
with no sword drawn, but that my open sword lay on the table beside me
while I was asleep, and that it had let out his life-blood."

"Why was he killed?" she asked, horror-stricken and with pale lips.

"I do not know, but if I killed him, it was because I revolted from the
proposals he made to me. I--" He paused, for the look on her face was
painful to see, and her body was as that of one who had been struck by
lightning. It had a crumpled, stricken look, and all force seemed to be
driven from it. It had the look of crushed vitality. Her face was set in
paleness, her eyes were frightened, her whole person was, as it were, in
ghastly captivity. His heart smote him, and he pulled himself together
to tell her all.

"Go on," she said. "I want to hear. I want--to know all. I ought to have
known--long ago; but that can't be helped now. Continue--please."

Her words had come slowly, in gasps almost, and her voice was so frayed
he could scarcely recognize it. All the pride of her nature seemed
shattered.

"If I killed him," he said presently, "it was because he tried to tempt
me from my allegiance to the Crown to become a servant of France, to--"

He stopped short, for a cry came from her lips which appalled him.

"My God--my God!" she said with bloodless lips, her eyes fastened on his
face, her every look and motion the inflection of despair. "Go on--tell
all," she added presently with more composure.

Swiftly he described what happened in the little room at the traitor's
tavern, of the momentary reconciliation and the wine that he drank,
drugged wine poured out but not drunk by Erris Boyne, and of his later
unconsciousness. At last he paused.

"Why did these things not come out at the trial?" she asked in hushed
tones.

He made a helpless gesture. "I did not speak of them because I thought
of you. I hid it--I did not want you to know what your father was."

Something like a smile gathered at her pale lips. "You saved me for
the moment, and condemned yourself for ever," she said in a voice of
torture. "If you had told what he was--if you had told that, the jury
would not have condemned you, they would not h