She was seen on the club-house road that night, by a person amply qualified to identify her." "So I've been told." "The person driving this horse wore a hat, identified as an old one of yours, which hat was afterwards found at your house on a remote peg in a seldom-used closet.

If you were not this person, how can you explain the use of your horse, the use of your clothes, the locking of the stable-door--which you declare yourself to have left open--and the hanging up of the key on its own nail ?" It was a crucial question--how crucial no one knew but our two selves.

If he answered at all, he must compromise Carmel.

I had no fear of his doing this, but I had great fear of what Ella might do if he let this implication stand and made no effort to exonerate himself by denying his presence in the cutter, and consequent return to the Cumberland home.

The quick side glances I here observed cast in her direction by both father and mother, showed that she had made some impulsive demonstration visible to them, if not to others and fearful of the consequences if I did not make some effort to hold her in check, I kept my eyes in her direction, and so lost Arthur's look and the look of his counsel as he answered, with just the word I had expected--a short and dogged: "I cannot explain." It was my death warrant.