understand. But its meaning
came to me later. I could not rest till it did."

At the next moment he was half way around a corner, and in another,
out of sight.

This was the evening's event.

XXXIII

THE ARROW OF DEATH

O if you rear this house against this house,
It will the wofulest division prove
That ever fell upon this cursed earth.

_Prometheus Unbound_.

In my first glance around the court-room the next morning, I sought first
for Carmel and then for the detective Sweetwater. Neither was visible.
But this was not true of Ella. She had come in on her father's arm,
closely followed by the erect figure of her domineering mother. As I
scrutinised the latter's bearing, I seemed to penetrate the mystery of
her nature. Whatever humiliation she may have felt at the public
revelation of her daughter's weakness, it had been absorbed by her love
for that daughter, or had been forced, through the agency of her
indomitable will, to become a ministrant to her pride which was
unassailable. She had accepted the position exacted from her by the
situation, and she looked for no loss of prestige, either on her
daughter's or her own account. Such was the language of her eyes; and it
was a language which should have assured Ella that she had a better
friend in her mother than she had ever dreamed of. The entrance of the
defendant cut short my contemplation of any mere spectator. The change
in him was so marked that I was conscious of it before I really saw him.
Every eye had reflected it, and it was no surprise to me when I noted the
relieved, almost cheerful aspect of his countenance as he took his place
and met his counsel's greeting with a smile--the first, I believe, which
had been seen on his face since his sister's death. That counsel I had
already noted. He was cheerful also, but with a restrained cheerfulness.
His task was not yet over, and the grimness of Mr. Fox, and the
non-committal aspect of the jurymen, proved that it was not to be made
too easy for him.

The crier announced the opening of the court, and the defence proceeded
by the calling of Ella Fulton to the witness stand.

I need not linger over her testimony. It was very short and contained but
one surprise. She had stated under direct examination that she had waited
and watched for Arthur's return that whole night, and was positive that
he had not passed through their grounds again after that first time in
the early evening. This was just wha