said in a broken voice, "but--but I don't
know whether I am a murderer or an executioner, and I never shall know.
God help me! Well," he added with a sigh, "what is done, is done. Let us
go to bed."

James said when they parted at his room door that he hoped Mrs. Ewing
would have a comfortable night.

"Yes, she will," replied Gordon quietly. Then he gave the young man's
hand a warm clasp. "God bless you!" he whispered. "If this had turned
you against the child, it would have driven me madder than I am now. I
love her as if she were my own. You and your loyalty are all I have to
hold to."

"You can hold to that to the end," James returned with warmth, and he
looked at Gordon as he might have looked at his own father.

Late as it was, he wrote that night to his own father and mother,
telling them of his engagement to Clemency. There now can be no possible
need for secrecy with regard to it. James, in spite of his vague sense
of horror, felt an exhilaration at the thought that now all could be
above board, that the shutters could be flung open. He felt as if an
incubus had rolled from his mental consciousness. Clemency herself
experienced something of the same feeling. She appeared at the
breakfast-table the next morning with her hat. "Uncle says I may go with
you on your rounds," she said to James. She beamed, and yet there was a
troubled and puzzled expression on her pretty face. When she and James
had started, and were moving swiftly along the country road, she said
suddenly, "Will you tell me something?"

James hesitated.

"Will you?" she repeated.

"I can't promise, dear," he said.

"Why not?" she asked pettishly.

"Because it might be something which I ought not to tell you."

"You ought to tell me everything if--if--" she hesitated, and blushed.

"If what?" asked James tenderly.

She nestled up to him. "If you--feel toward me as you say you do."

"If. Oh, Clemency!"

"Then you ought to tell me. No, you needn't kiss me. I want you to tell
me something. I don't want to be kissed."

"Well, what is that you want to know, dear?"

"Will you promise to tell me?"

"No, dear, I can't promise, but I will tell you if I am able without
doing you harm."

"Who was that man who was buried yesterday, who had been hunting me so
long, and frightening me and Uncle Tom, and why have I been compelled to
stay housed as if I were a prisoner so much of my life?"

"Because you were in danger, dear, from the man."