r all your hurry and your indifference,
to get the stable key and look in at a horse that wasn't sick enough to
keep your coachman home from a dance."

The prisoner was silent.

"You have no further explanation to give on this subject?"

"No. All fellows who love horses will understand."

The district attorney shrugged this answer away before he went on to say:
"You have listened to Zadok Brown's testimony. When he returned at three,
he found the stable-door locked, and the key hanging up on its usual nail
in the kitchen. How do you account for this?"

"There are two ways."

"Mention them, if you please."

"Zadok had been to a dance, and may not have been quite clear as to what
he saw. Or, finding the stable door open, may have blamed himself for the
fact and sought to cover up his fault with a lie."

"Have you ever caught him in a lie?"

"No; but there's always a first time."

"You would impeach his testimony then?"

"No. You asked me how this discrepancy could be explained, and I have
tried to show you."

"Mr. Cumberland, the grey mare was out that night; this has been
amply proved."

"If you believe Zadok, yes."

"You have heard other testimony corroborative of this fact. She was seen
on the club-house road that night, by a person amply qualified to
identify her."

"So I've been told."

"The person driving this horse wore a hat, identified as an old one of
yours, which hat was afterwards found at your house on a remote peg in a
seldom-used closet. If you were not this person, how can you explain the
use of your horse, the use of your clothes, the locking of the
stable-door--which you declare yourself to have left open--and the
hanging up of the key on its own nail?"

It was a crucial question--how crucial no one knew but our two selves. If
he answered at all, he must compromise Carmel. I had no fear of his doing
this, but I had great fear of what Ella might do if he let this
implication stand and made no effort to exonerate himself by denying his
presence in the cutter, and consequent return to the Cumberland home. The
quick side glances I here observed cast in her direction by both father
and mother, showed that she had made some impulsive demonstration visible
to them, if not to others and fearful of the consequences if I did not
make some effort to hold her in check, I kept my eyes in her direction,
and so lost Arthur's look and the look of his counsel as he answered,
with just the word I ha