and the
quarrel had to pause. Ardea had a nerve-shaking conviction that it would
never do to leave it in the air. He must be made to understand, once for
all, that he had sinned beyond forgiveness. She caught up the light wrap
she had been wearing earlier in the evening and turned to one of the
windows opening on the rear veranda. "Come with me," she whispered; and
he followed obediently.

But there was no privacy to be had out of doors. There was a goodly
scattering of people in the veranda chairs enjoying the perfect night
and the white moonlight. Ardea stopped suddenly.

"You were intending to walk down to the valley?" she asked.

He nodded.

"I will walk with you to the cliff edge."

It was a short hundred yards, and there were many abroad in the graveled
walks: lovers in pairs, and groups of young people pensive or
chattering. So it was not until they stood on the very battlements of
the western cliff that they were measurably alone.

"Has no one told you what happened last March--on the day of the ice
storm?" she asked coldly.

"No."

"Don't you know it without being told?"

"Of course, I don't; why should I?"

His angry impassiveness shook her resolution. It seemed incredible that
the most accomplished dissembler could rise to such supreme heights of
seeming.

"I used to think I knew you," she said, faltering, "but I don't. Why
don't you despise hypocrisy and double-dealing as you used to?"

"I do; more heartily than ever."

"Yet, in spite of that, you have--oh, it is perfectly unspeakable!"

"I am taking your word for it," he rejoined gloomily. "You are denying
me what the most wretched criminal is taught to believe is his right--to
know what he is accused of."

"Have you forgotten that night last winter when you--when I saw you at
the gate with Nancy Bryerson?"

"I'm not likely to forget it."

She seized her courage and held it fast, putting maidenly shame to the
wall.

"Tom, it is a terrible thing to say--and your punishment will be
terrible. _But you must marry Nancy!_"

"And father another man's child?--not much!" he answered brutally.

"And father your own children--two of them," she said, with bitter
emphasis.

"Oh, that's it, is it?" he said, with a deeper scowl. "So there are two
of them, are there? That's why no woman in Mr. Farley's country colony
is at home to me any more, I suppose." And then, still more bitterly:
"Of course, you are all sure of this?--Nan has at last con