“Not--not right now; tell her to play something; something low and soft that’ll make the devil let me alone. I want to think. I--I reckon I’m willing to go to the convict camps now for trying to square up with Parker; I reckon I _ought_ to go!” Tregarvon went out softly, closing the door behind him and groping his way down the stair. Richardia was waiting for him in the hall below, as he hoped she would be, and she led him across to the drawing-room where there were lights and a wood-fire purring and crackling in the big stone fireplace. “Tell me,” she entreated. “There is nothing to tell--nothing that you haven’t already guessed. I am completely disarmed, as you knew I would be. I have assured your brother that he has nothing to fear from me.” “It has been very dreadful,” she said, moving aside to hold her hands out to the fire. “How badly was he hurt in the explosion?” “So badly that it is only within the past few days that we have dared to hope. Mr. Carfax hasn’t told you?” “Not a word. Your secret has been guarded very carefully.” “But now it is a secret no longer. If he gets well it will only be to face a trial for the attempt upon Mr. Parker’s life.” “Nothing will come of that,” Tregarvon predicted confidently. “Parker is dead; he died suddenly in his New York office a few days ago. And no twelve Tennesseeans could ever be found who would convict your brother for trying to avenge his father’s wrongs.” “We are your poor debtors--all of us,” she went on. “You are heaping coals of fire on our heads, and--and they _burn_! Of course, you know now that I was my brother’s accomplice?” “I know nothing of the sort; of course, you were not!” “But I was--in a way. All along, I feared that it was he who was making, or at least planning, all the trouble you were having. He was _so_ bitter!” Tregarvon nodded complete comprehension. “I knew you were anxious about somebody; I thought, at first, that it was Hartridge, and later that it was your father. You have had a heavy burden to carry; and I have been doing what I could to make it heavier.” “You have,” she said quite frankly. He did not affect to misunderstand. “You knew all the time that Poictiers and Elizabeth were held apart only by Elizabeth’s engagement to me?” “I guessed it. But that didn’t excuse you for--for----” “For making love to you? I know it didn’t. But I had my punishment the Sunday afternoon when you met your brother in the wood above the ‘Pocket.’ I had gone out to meet Hartridge, and I saw you two together. I took it for granted that the man was your lover who, for some reason, couldn’t come here to Westwood House to meet you.” “Others took it for granted, too, and I did not deny it--for Richard’s sake.” “Is his name Richard?” “Yes; Richard and Richardia. My father named us so, after a brother and sister of his own who were twins.”