How could she do this thing?
How could she have permitted it to be even suggested to her?
And then, swift through her tortured mind flashed his words: "There will be an end.

I have had to face it to-night." Was it this that he had meant?
Was it for this that he had been preparing her?
With a muffled exclamation she rose, trembling in every limb.

"I can't!" she cried piteously, "oh, I can't! Please go away!" It might have been the frightened prayer of a child, so beseeching was it, so full of weakness.

But Nick Ratcliffe heard it unmoved.

He waited a few seconds till she came to a stand by the table, her back towards him.