From her belt hung a small leather bag, of the kind that one sees in Bond Street shop windows. She opened this, and without speaking took out a key, and threw it down on the sofa. "Thank you," I said. "And now, if you won't think me inquisitive, may I ask why you wanted to shoot me?" She stared at me with a look in which loathing and surprise were very prettily mingled. "Why do you pretend you don't know?" she asked contemptuously. I shook my head. "On my honour," I said, "I haven't the remotest idea." Her lip curled delightfully, and she drew herself up to her full height. "I am Mercia Solano," she said. I bowed. "It's a charming name," I observed, "but, under the circumstances, Mercia seems a little out of place." "Ah, you can jest!" she cried bitterly. "You were well named the Satyr of Culebra." "Really!" I said. "You embarrass me. I had no idea people were so complimentary. But what have I done to deserve all these little attentions?" "What have you done!" Her hands clenched, and her breast rose and fell in superb indignation. "You ask me what you have done, when the grass is still brown above my father's body!" Burying her face in her hands, she broke down and sobbed like a child. I must admit that for a moment I felt an unspeakable brute. Under my breath I cursed Northcote heartily. "You can believe me or not, as you choose," I said, "but I had no more to do with your father's death than you had." She stopped crying, and taking away her hands gazed at me wildly. "Oh, what are you saying?" she moaned. "What is the good of lying to me? Wasn't I by his side when they shot him down? Look here--" She tore back the sleeve of her dress, baring her arm almost to the shoulder, and showing an angry scar that seamed its white beauty. "Here is the very mark of your bullets, and you dare to stand there and lie to my face! Oh, God! are you a man or a devil?" She sank down on the sofa again, in a very abandonment of passion and grief. I crushed back a sudden savage desire to take her in my arms and explain everything. "Look at me," I said, with some sternness, and she raised her head. "Do I seem to you like a man who is lying?" I went on harshly. "I swear to you by my mother's name, by everything I hold sacred, that I was in no way to blame for your father's death. I can't tell you more at present, but before God I'm speaking the literal truth." The savage earnestness in my voice seemed to have some effect. Into her eyes, which were fixed on mine, there crept a kind of reluctant doubt, and with puzzled gesture she passed her hand across her forehead. "I--I don't understand," she said faintly. "Guarez--" Then she stopped abruptly. "Yes?" I said, with an encouraging air. It struck me that Guarez was possibly a gentleman whom it would be healthy to know a little about. But an obstinate fit seemed suddenly to have come over her, for her lips closed and she got up from the sofa without finishing the sentence.