l me," she had said
desperately. "You would give your life, but you would destroy that
which is more than life to me. You did not intend to kill him. It was
no murder, it was punishment." Her voice had got harder. "He would have
killed my life because he was evil. Will you kill it because you are
good? Will you be brave, quixotic, but not pitiful?... No, no, no!"
she had said, as his hand was upon the gate, "I will not go unless you
promise that you will hide the truth, if you can." She had laid her hand
upon his shoulder with an agonised impulse. "You will hide it for a girl
who will cherish your memory her whole life long. Ah--God bless you!"

She had felt that she conquered before he spoke as, indeed, he did not
speak, but nodded his head and murmured something indistinctly. But that
did not matter, for she had won; she had a feeling that all would be
well. Then he had placed her in her carriage, and she was driven swiftly
away, saying to herself half hysterically: "I am safe, I am safe. He
will keep his word."

Her safety and his promise were the new factor which changed the
equation for which Kaid would presently ask the satisfaction. David's
life had suddenly come upon problems for which his whole past was no
preparation. Conscience, which had been his guide in every situation,
was now disarmed, disabled, and routed. It had come to terms.

In going quickly through the room, they had disarranged a table. The
girl's cloak had swept over it, and a piece of brie-a-brae had been
thrown upon the floor. He got up and replaced it with an attentive
air. He rearranged the other pieces on the table mechanically, seeing,
feeling another scene, another inanimate thing which must be for ever
and for ever a picture burning in his memory. Yet he appeared to be
casually doing a trivial and necessary act. He did not definitely
realise his actions; but long afterwards he could have drawn an accurate
plan of the table, could have reproduced upon it each article in its
exact place as correctly as though it had been photographed. There were
one or two spots of dust or dirt on the floor, brought in by his boots
from the garden. He flicked them aside with his handkerchief.

How still it was! Or was it his life which had become so still? It
seemed as if the world must be noiseless, for not a sound of the life in
other parts of the Palace came to him, not an echo or vibration of the
city which stirred beyond the great gateway. Was it th