.

"You pushed Jean Benton over the wharf into the harbour and left her to
drown; that is what you did."

Douglas spoke slowly and impressively, and each word fell like a deadly
blow upon the man before him. His face, pale a minute before, was now
like death. He tried to speak but the words rattled in his throat. He
grasped the side of the car for support, and then made an effort to
recover his composure. The perspiration stood in great beads on his
forehead, and his staring eyes never left the face of his accuser.

"I wish you could see yourself," the latter quietly remarked. "You'd
certainly make a great picture. When you threatened to make this place
too hot for me, you didn't expect to feel very uncomfortable that way
yourself in such a short time, did you?"

"W-who in the devil's name are you?" Ben gasped.

"Oh, I don't pretend to be as intimate with the devil as you are, and
appealing to me in his name doesn't do any good. It makes no
difference who I am. You know that what I just said is true, and you
can't deny it."

"But suppose I do deny it, what then?"

"H'm, you are talking nonsense now. It's no use for you to do any
bluffing. The victim of your deviltry is lying sick unto death at Mrs.
Dempster's. You had better go to her at once and make what amends you
can before it is too late."

"Ah, I know," Ben replied, regaining somewhat his former composure.
"Jean has been stuffing you with lies. She's a little vixen, and wants
to get me into trouble."

"Look here," and Douglas' voice was stern as he spoke. "Don't you
begin anything like that. I have never spoken a word to Jean Benton,
and as far as I know she has never said anything about your cowardly
deed to her. She is as true as steel in her love for you, and my
advice is for you to act like a man, go to her, be true to her, and
marry her as you promised you would that night you hurled her into the
harbour."

"You are lying," Ben blustered. "If Jean didn't tell you this
cock-and-bull yarn, how would you know anything about it?"

"I am not lying, Ben Stubbles. There were eyes watching your every
action that night on Long Wharf; there were ears listening to what you
said, and but for these hands of mine Jean Benton would be dead, and
you would now be arrested for murdering her."

"You! You heard, and saw, and saved her!" Ben gasped, shrinking back
from before the steady gaze of his pitiless accuser.

"I did," was the quiet repl