“Ye-es, and I shall never forget what he did, what he said. He came into the room with glaring eyes--’pon my soul, I thought he had been bitten by a mad dog, Elshaw! He flew at me, showing his teeth. He shook me till my teeth chattered; he called me all the names he could think of that had anything brutal and opprobrious in the sound. He told me my daughter had killed his son, murdered him; and he said that he would get her penal servitude if they didn’t bring it in what it was--murder! What do you think of that? What do you think of that? And I, in my weak state, to hear it! I give you my word, Elshaw, I never thought I should get home alive!” There was a pause. Mr. Biron wiped his face. His hands were shaking; his voice was tremulous and hoarse. He looked as pitiful a wretch as it was possible to imagine. “Did he tell you--how it happened?” asked Bram in a low voice. He was hoping, always hoping against hope, that some new fact would come to light which would shift the blame of the awful catastrophe from Claire’s poor little shoulders. But Mr. Biron had no comfort for him. “Yes,” sobbed he. “He told me she had gone down to the works to see her cousin----” “Ah, if she had only not done that! Not been forced to do that,” broke from Bram’s lips. Theodore grew suddenly quiet, and stared at him apprehensively. “How was she forced to do it?” he asked querulously. But Bram did not answer. “Well, yes. What else did Mr. Cornthwaite say?” asked he. “And that they quarrelled close to the railway line. And that she--she--’pon my soul, I can’t see how it’s possible--a little bit of a girl like that! He says she dragged Christian down, and flung him in front of a train that was coming along! Of course, we know that woman is an incomprehensible creature; but how one of only five feet high could throw down a young man of stoutish build like Christian is more than even I, with all my experience of the sex, can understand!” Bram was frowning, deep in thought. Again he did not make any answer. “That’s all I heard. Have you learnt any more particulars yourself, Elshaw?” “I was there,” replied Bram simply. This gave Mr. Biron a great shock. He began to shiver again, and subsided from the buoyant manner he had begun to assume into the terror-stricken attitude of a few minutes before. He turned to clutch the banisters to help him upstairs. “Well,” said he in a complaining voice, as he began to drag himself up, “if she did it, that’s no reason why everybody should be down upon me! Meg Tyzack, too! A fury like that! What right has she to follow me, to persecute me?” “The poor creature’s had her brain turned, I think, by--by the treatment she’s received,” said Bram.