Page:Anna Katharine Green - Leavenworth Case.djvu/169

Rh "How could we, Miss Leavenworth?"

Her head fell forward in her hands, and for one wild moment she seemed lost in despair. Then she roused, and desperately exclaimed:

"And that is why you come here to-night. With that sentence written upon your heart, you invade my presence, torture me with questions"

"Pardon me," I broke in; "are my questions such as you, with reasonable regard for the honor of one with whom you are accustomed to associate, should hesitate to answer? Do I derogate from my manhood in asking you how and why you came to make an accusation of so grave a nature, at a time when all the circumstances of the case were freshly before you, only to insist fully as strongly upon your cousin’s innocence when you found there was even more cause for your imputation than you had supposed?"

She did not seem to hear me. "Oh, my cruel fate!" she murmured. "Oh, my cruel fate!"

"Miss Leavenworth," said I, rising, and taking my stand before her; "although there is a temporary estrangement between you and your cousin, you cannot wish to seem her enemy. Speak, then; let me at least know the name of him for whom she thus immolates herself. A hint from you"

But rising, with a strange look, to her feet, she interrupted me with a stern remark: "If you do not know, I cannot inform you; do not ask me, Mr. Raymond." And she glanced at the clock for the second time.

I took another turn.

"Miss Leavenworth, you once asked me if a person who had committed a wrong ought necessarily to confess it; and I replied no, unless by the confession reparation could be made. Do you remember?"