," he cried. "After all, Stella, it was an
accident."

But Stella sat mutely at his side. Some struggle was taking place in her
and was reflected in her countenance. Thresk's eager joy was damped.

"No, my friend," she said at length, slowly and very deliberately. "It
was not an accident."

"But you fired in fear." Thresk caught now at that alternative. "You shot
in self-defence. Stella, I blundered at Bombay." He moved away from her
in his agitation. "I am sorry. Oh, I am very sorry. I should never have
come forward at all. I should have lain quiet and let your counsel
develop his case, as he was doing, on the line of self-defence. You would
have been acquitted--and rightly acquitted. You would have had the
sympathy of every one. But I didn't know your story. I was afraid that
the discovery of Ballantyne outside the tent would ruin you. I knew that
my story could not fail to save you. So I told it. But I was wrong,
Stella. I blundered. I did you a great harm."

He was standing before her now and so poignant an anguish rang in his
voice that Stella was moved by it to discard her plans. Thus she had
meant to tell the story if ever she was driven to it. Thus she had told
it. But now she put out a timid hand and took him by the arm.

"I said I would tell you the truth. But I have not told it all. It's so
hard not to keep one little last thing back. Listen to me"; and with a
bowed head and her hand still clinging desperately to his arm she made
the final revelation.

"It's true I was crazy with fear. But there was just one little moment
when I knew what I was going to do, when it came upon me that the way I
had chosen before was the wrong one, and this new way the right one. No,
no," she cried as Thresk moved. "Even that's not all. That moment--you
could hardly measure it in time, yet to me it was distinct enough and is
marked distinctly in my memories, for during it _he_ drew back."

"What?" cried Thresk. "Don't say it, Stella!"

"Yes," she answered. "During it he drew back, knowing what I was going to
do just as I suddenly knew it. It was a moment when he seemed to me to
bleat--yes, that's the word--to bleat for mercy."

She had told the truth now and she dropped her hand from his sleeve.

"And you? What did you do?" asked Thresk.

"I? Oh, I went mad, I think. When I saw him lying there I lost my head.
The tent was flecked with great spots of fire which whirled in front of
my eyes and hurt. A strength far grea