"You promised me you would, and you shall, James Huish. Look here, sir. A little over two years ago there was a servant at the cottage--a cold hard girl. I come back here, and I find this same girl now a woman. She recognised me when I met her yesterday, and, believing that I was going to the cottage, she stopped me, and by degrees told me such a tale as I would I had never lived to hear. I went away again yesterday half mad, hardly believing that it could be true. To-day I returned, and she pointed you out to me as the villain--as Mr Ranby--a serpent crawling here to poison under an assumed name." "Go on," said the other. "You meant marriage of course." "I tell you, man, I never had a thought for that poor girl that was not pure and true. If I had spoken so soon, it might have checked an intercourse that was to me the happiest of my life. Now I come back and find that the peace of that little home is blasted--that the woman I have loved has been made the toy of your pleasure; that you whom I believed to be a gentleman, a man of honour, have proved to be the greatest of villains upon this earth." "Have a care what you say," said Huish hotly. "I will have a care," cried the other. "I will not condemn you on the words of others; I would not so condemn the man who was my closest friend. Speak, then; tell me. I say, is this all true?" "You have no right to question me." "I say, is this true, James Huish?" "Look here. What is the use of making a fuss like this over a bit of an affair of gallantry." "What!" cried the other, grasping the arm of Huish once more tightly. "An affair of gallantry? Is it, then, an affair of gallantry to come upon a home like a blight--to destroy--yes, blast the life of a pure, trusting, simple-hearted girl, who believes you to be the soul of honour? James Huish, I do not understand these terms; but tell me this," he continued in a voice that was terrible in its cold measured tones, "is this true?" "Is what true?" said the other, with an attempt at bravado. "You know what I mean--about Mary Riversley." "Well, there, yes, I suppose it is," said Huish, with assumed indifference; "and now the murder's out." "No," exclaimed the other, with the rage he had been beating down struggling hard for the mastery; "not murder: it is worse. But look here, Huish. This girl is fatherless," he continued in a voice quite unnaturally calm. "I loved her very dearly, but, poor girl, her affection has gone to another. She cannot be my wife, but I can be her friend and I will. You will marry her at once." "Not likely," was the scornful reply, as Huish tried to shake his arm free.