Page:The council of seven.djvu/310

 privilege with his life. But the question remained, how much would it be expedient to tell her?

One fact he did not doubt. Enemies, terrible and implacable, would be ranged against him. And if they should once suspect that their secrets had been divulged to Helen, her life, too, would not be worth a moment's purchase.

In spite of that, however, embarked on his strange story, he found it beyond his power to withhold any material detail. It became a sheer impossibility to choose or select. All had to be known, once the die was cast. Listening in grief and horror to a narrative of events which began with John's rooted conviction that the world was now at grips with a terrible evil, Helen was yet able in some measure to impose her will upon the man she loved. A deep instinct told her that the only hope of saving his life lay with her; and if so frail a chance was to be fruitful, she must acquaint herself with all the strands of the coil in which he was involved.