ctions you should have come down from the
bench and washed your hands of the whole affair. The very action would
have given me a chance--"

"You mustn't speak like that to my husband," Mrs. Wayne broke in,
indignantly, from the doorway. "If you only knew what he has suffered on
your account--"

"Is it anything like what I've suffered on his?"

"I dare say it's worse. He has scarcely slept or eaten since he knew he
would have to pass that dreadful sen--"

"Come! come!" Wayne exclaimed, in the impatient tone of a man who puts an
end to a useless discussion. "We can't spend time on this subject any
longer. I'm not on my defence--"

"You _are_ on your defence," Ford declared, instantly. "Even your wife
puts you there. We're not in a courtroom as we were this morning.
Circumstantial evidence means nothing to us in this isolated house, where
you're no longer the judge, as I'm no longer the prisoner. We're just two
naked human beings, stripped of everything but their inborn rights--and I
claim mine."

"Well--what are they?"

"They're simple enough. I claim the right to have something to eat, and to
go my way without being molested--or betrayed. You'll admit I'm not
asking much."

"You may have the food," Mrs. Wayne said, in a tone not without
compassion. "I'll go and get it."

For a minute or two there was no sound but that of her cough, as she sped
down a passage. Before speaking, Wayne passed his hand across his brow as
though in an effort to clear his mental vision.

"No; you don't seem to be asking much. But, as a matter of fact, you're
demanding my pledge to my country. I undertook to administer its laws--"

Ford sprang up.

"You've done it," he cried, "and I'm the result! You've administered the
law right up to its hilt, and your duty as a judge is performed. Surely
you're free now to think of yourself as a man and to treat me as one."

"I might do that, and still think you a man dangerous to leave at large."

"But do you?"

"That's my affair. Whatever your opinion of the courts that have judged
your case, I must accept their verdict."

"In your official capacity--yes; but not here, as host to the poor dog who
comes under your roof for shelter. My rights are sacred. Even the wild
Arab--"

He paused abruptly. Over Wayne's shoulder, through the window still open
to the terrace, he saw a figure cross the darkness. Could his pursuers be
waiting outside for their chance to spring on him? A perceptible fr