yed some meaning to him.

"We will never speak of this again, my friend," she said; "but now that
no harm can be done by it, it seemed right to tell you I knew."

"I ought never to have drawn," said Hugh, hoarsely.

"No," said Rachel. "He was in fault to demand such a thing. It was
inhuman. But having once drawn he had to abide by it, as you would have
done if you had drawn the short lighter."

She was looking earnestly at him, as at one given back from the grave.

"Yes," said Hugh, feeling she expected him to speak. "If I had drawn it
I should have had to abide by it."

"I thank God continually that you did not draw it. You made him the
dreadful reparation he asked. If it recoiled upon himself you were not
to blame. You have done wrong, and you have repented. You have suffered,
Hugh. I know it by your face. And perhaps I have suffered too, but that
is past. We will shut up the past, and think of the future. Promise me
that you will never speak of this again."

"I promise," said Hugh, mechanically.

"The moment to speak is past," he said to himself.

Had it ever been present?

CHAPTER XLV

Dieu n'oublie personne. Il visite tout le monde.--VINET.

Hugh did not sleep that night.

His escape had been too narrow. He shivered at the mere thought of it.
It had never struck him as possible that Rachel and Lady Newhaven had
known of the drawing of lots. Now that he found they knew, sundry small
incidents, unnoticed at the time, came crowding back to his memory. That
was why Lady Newhaven had written so continually those letters which he
had burned unread. That was why she had made that desperate attempt to
see him in the smoking-room at Wilderleigh after the boating accident.
She wanted to know which had drawn the short lighter. That explained the
mysterious tension which Hugh had noticed in Rachel during the last days
in London before--before the time was up. He saw it all now. And, of
course, they naturally supposed that Lord Newhaven had committed
suicide. They could not think otherwise. They were waiting for one of
the two men to do it.

"If Lord Newhaven had not turned giddy and stumbled on to the line, if
he had not died by accident when he did," said Hugh to himself, "where
should I be now?"

There was no answer to that question.

What was the use of asking it? He _was_ dead. And, fortunately, the two
women firmly believed he had died by his own hand. Hugh as firmly
believed that the deat