, he had tried to put it on my finger in a meeting we had
in the woods back of his aunt's house. But I refused to allow him. The
prospect ahead was too dismal and unrelenting for us to betroth
ourselves, whatever our hopes or wishes might be."

"You--you had a meeting with this man in the woods the day before his
aunt was assaulted," echoed Mr. Orcutt, turning upon her with an
amazement that swallowed up his wrath.

"Yes."

"And he afterward visited her house?"

"Yes."

"And dropped that ring there?"

"Yes."

Starting slowly, as if the thoughts roused by this short statement of
facts were such as demanded instant consideration, Mr. Orcutt walked to
the other side of the room, where he paced up and down in silence for
some minutes. When he returned it was the lawyer instead of the lover
who stood before her.

"Then, it was the simple fact of finding this gentleman's ring on the
floor of Mrs. Clemmens' dining-room that makes you consider him the
murderer of his aunt?" he asked, with a tinge of something like irony in
his tone.

"No," she breathed rather than answered. "That was a proof, of course,
that he had been there, but I should never have thought of it as an
evidence of guilt if the woman herself had not uttered, in our hearing
that tell-tale exclamation of 'Ring and Hand,' and if, in the talk I
held with Mr. Mansell the day before, he had not betrayed---- Why do you
stop me?" she whispered.

"I did not stop you," he hastily assured her. "I am too anxious to hear
what you have to say. Go on, Imogene. What did this Mansell betray? I--I
ask as a father might," he added, with some dignity and no little
effort.

But her fears had taken alarm, or her caution been aroused, and she
merely said:

"The five thousand dollars which his aunt leaves him is just the amount
he desired to start him in life."

"Did he wish such an amount?" Mr. Orcutt asked.

"Very much."

"And acknowledged it in the conversation he had with you?"

"Yes."

"Imogene," declared the lawyer, "if you do not want to insure Mr.
Mansell's indictment, I would suggest to you not to lay too great stress
upon any _talk_ you may have held with him."

But she cried with unmoved sternness, and a relentless crushing down of
all emotion that was at once amazing and painful to see:

"The innocent is to be saved from the gallows, no matter what the fate
of the guilty may be."

And a short but agitated silence followed which Mr. Orcutt broke