eaven!"

And Rette, wondering and vaguely touched, complied.

McElroy was looking, after his habit, at the leaping flames and his thin
hands played absently and constantly with the covering of the bed, when
the door opened and closed and the little maid stood shrinking against
it.

He did not look up for long, thinking, if his dull mind could form a
thought through his melancholy dreams, that Ridgar had come in.

At last a sigh that was like a gasp pierced his lethargy and he raised
his eyes.

She stood with one small hand over her beating heart and her cheeks
white in the firelight.

"Ah! little one!" he said gently. "Why did you come through such a
night? 'Tis wild as--as--Sit in the big chair," he added kindly.

But Francette, in whose face was an unbearable anguish, came swiftly and
fell on her knees beside the bed, raising her eyes to his.

"M'sieu!" she cried, with great labouring breaths. "Oh! M'sieu, I have
come to confess! If there is in your good heart pity for one who has
sinned beyond pardon, give it me, I pray, for love of the good God!"
McElroy stared down at her in wonder.

"Confess? Sinned?" he said. "Why, little one, what can a child like you
know of sin? 'Tis only some blunderer like myself who should speak its
damnable name."

"Nay, nay! Oh, no! No! No! Not on you is there one lightest touch,
M'sieu, but on me,--me--me--does rest the weight of all!"

Her eyes were wide and full of tears, and McElroy laid a weak hand on
her head.

"Hush, child!" he said, with some of his old sternness, when condemning
wrong; "there is a fever at your brain. You have come too long to this
dull room--"

"No! No! Take away your hand! Touch me not, M'sieu, for I am as dust
beneath your feet! I alone am at bottom of all that has happened in Fort
de Seviere this year past! Through me alone have come death and sorrow
and misunderstanding! I caused it all, M'sieu, because I--loved you! For
love of you and hope to gain your heart I set you apart from that woman
of Grand Portage!"

She buried her face on the covering of the bed and her voice came
muffled and choking.

"That night at the factory steps,--you recall, M'sieu,--she came to
you,--I saw her in the dusk as she turned at the corner, a rod away, saw
her and knew with some touch of deviltry the sudden way of keeping you
from her, your arms from about her, your lips from hers! Oh, that I
could not bear, M'sieu! Not though I died for it! So I threw my own