Curiously enough, as on that first morning when, they had met in the Embankment Gardens, a little ray of wintry sunshine, which had stolen in through the dusty, uncurtained windows, lay between them. Aaron Rodd, whose first impulse had been one of joy at this unexpected visit, stopped suddenly in his progress across the room. There was something so entirely different about her, a change so absolute and mystifying. The faintly supercilious deportment and expression of the young woman of the world, carrying herself so easily and with such natural grace and self-possession, seemed to have deserted her. She was suddenly a frightened child seeking for shelter, and with a lightning-like effort of imagination he seemed to see her flying for sanctuary from those terrors of which he had already warned her. "Is anything wrong?" he enquired quickly--"anything fresh, I mean?" She sank into his chair. She was panting a little, as though she had been hurrying. "I am afraid!" she confessed. "I am terrified! Give me your hand to hold, and listen." She gripped his strong fingers. They both almost held their breaths. There was no sound except the distant rumble of traffic. By degrees she grew calmer. "You are not worrying about my errand?" he asked anxiously. "You know what happened to me?" "It isn't that," she told him simply. "That was all planned beforehand. You didn't mind?" "Of course not," he assured her. "It is something which happened before I came to England," she went on, "something terrible, something from which it seems to me I can never escape. Listen.... I must tell you one day--I shall tell you now. Leopold has always been fortunate, but the luck went against me one day. I was face to face with detection. I had the whole of the jewels in my possession. I was confronted with the worst. I hadn't time to think. I killed the man who would have brought ruin on all of us, and--and, on me, worse than ruin.... Do you hear?--I killed him!" Aaron Rodd sat speechless. She seemed so small and delicate-looking. It was incredible!