es
in her own breast--how will you account for that? I can imagine a woman
devoting herself to the shielding of a husband from the consequences of
crime; but a cousin's husband, never."

Mr. Gryce put his feet very close together, and softly grunted. "Then
you still think Mr. Clavering the assassin of Mr. Leavenworth?"

I could only stare at him in my sudden doubt and dread. "Still think?" I
repeated.

"Mr. Clavering the murderer of Mr. Leavenworth?"

"Why, what else is there to think? You don't--you can't--suspect
Eleanore of having deliberately undertaken to help her cousin out of a
difficulty by taking the life of their mutual benefactor?"

"No," said Mr. Gryce; "no, I do not think Eleanore Leavenworth had any
hand in the business."

"Then who--" I began, and stopped, lost in the dark vista that was
opening before me.

"Who? Why, who but the one whose past deceit and present necessity
demanded his death as a relief? Who but the beautiful, money-loving,
man-deceiving goddess----"

I leaped to my feet in my sudden horror and repugnance. "Do not mention
the name! You are wrong; but do not speak the name."

"Excuse me," said he; "but it will have to be spoken many times, and we
may as well begin here and now--who then but Mary Leavenworth; or, if
you like it better, Mrs. Henry Clavering? Are you so much surprised? It
has been my thought from the beginning."

XXVI. MR. GRYCE EXPLAINS HIMSELF

"Sits the wind in that corner?"
--Much Ado about Nothing.

I DO not propose to enter into a description of the mingled feelings
aroused in me by this announcement. As a drowning man is said to live
over in one terrible instant the events of a lifetime, so each word
uttered in my hearing by Mary, from her first introduction to me in her
own room, on the morning of the inquest, to our final conversation on
the night of Mr. Clavering's call, swept in one wild phantasmagoria
through my brain, leaving me aghast at the signification which her whole
conduct seemed to acquire from the lurid light which now fell upon it.

"I perceive that I have pulled down an avalanche of doubts about your
ears," exclaimed my companion from the height of his calm superiority.
"You never thought of this possibility, then, yourself?"

"Do not ask me what I have thought. I only know I will never believe
your suspicions true. That, however much Mary may have been benefited by
her uncle's death, she never had a hand in it; actu