nes replied:

"Something dreadful; something superstitious. It was night, you
remember, and at night one has such horrible thoughts."

"Yet an hour or two later you declared that the hearth was no
lodestone. You forgot its horrors and your superstition upon
returning to your own house."

"It might be;" she murmured; "but if so, they soon returned. I
had reason for my horror, if not for my superstition, as the event
showed."

The coroner did not attempt to controvert this. He was about to
launch a final inquiry.

"Miss Tuttle; upon the return of yourself and Mr. Jeffrey to your
home after your final visit to the Moore house, did you have any
interview that was without witnesses?"

"No."

"Did you exchange any words?"

"I think we did exchange some words; it would be only natural."

"Are you willing to state what words?"

She looked dazed and appeared to search her memory.

"I don't think I can," she objected.

"But something was said by you and some answer was made by him?"

"I believe so."

"Can not you say definitely?"

"We did speak."

"In English?"

"No, in French."

"Can not you translate that French for us?"

"Pardon me, sir; it was so long ago my memory fails me."

"Is it any better for the second and longer interview between you
the next day?"

"No-sir."

"You can not give us any phrase or word that was uttered there?"

"No."

"Is this your final reply on this subject?"

"It is."

She never had been subjected to an interrogation like this before.
It made her proud soul quiver in revolt, notwithstanding the
patience with which she had fortified herself. With red cheeks
and glistening eyes she surveyed the man who had made her suffer so,
and instantly every other man there suffered with her; excepting
possibly Durbin, whose heart was never his strong point. But our
hearts were moved, our reasons were not convinced, as was presently
shown, when, with a bow of dismissal, the coroner released her, and
she passed back to her seat.

Simultaneously with her withdrawal the gleam of sensibility left
the faces of the jury, and the dark and brooding look which had
marked their countenances from the beginning returned, and returned
to stay.

What would their verdict be? There were present two persons who
affected to believe that it would be one of suicide occasioned by
dementia. These were Miss Tuttle and Mr. Jeffrey, who, now that
the critical period had come, straightened th