"I thought her false; who could think any other; appearances were so strong against her: others thought so beside me. I raised my hand to kill her; but she never winced. I trampled on him I believed her paramour: I fled, and soon I lay a dying in this house for her sake. I told thee she was dead. Alas! I thought her dead to me. I went back to our house (it is her house) sore against the grain, to get money for thee and thine. Then she cleared herself, bright as the sun, and pure as snow. She was all in black for me; she had put by money, against I should come to my senses and need it. I told her I owed a debt in Lancashire, a debt of gratitude as well as money: and so I did. How have I repaid it? The poor soul forced five hundred pounds on me. I had much ado to keep her from bringing it hither with her own hands; oh, villain! villain! Then I thought to leave thee, and send thee word I was dead; and heap money on thee. Money! But how could I? Thou wast my benefactress, my more than wife. All the riches of the world can make no return to thee. What, what shall I do? Shall I fly with thee and thy child across the seas? Shall I go back to her? No, the best thing I can do is to take this good pistol, and let the life out of my dishonorable carcass, and free two honest women from me by one resolute act." In his despair he cocked the pistol; and, at a word from Mercy, this tale had ended. But the poor woman, pale and trembling, tottered across the room, and took it out of his hand. "I would not harm thy body, nor thy soul," she gasped. "Let me draw my breath, and think." She rocked herself to and fro in silence. Griffith stood trembling like a criminal before his judge. It was long ere she could speak, for anguish. Yet when she did speak, it was with a sort of deadly calm. "Go tell the truth to _her_, as you have done to me: and, if she can forgive you, all the better for you. I can never forgive you, nor yet can harm you. My child, my child! Thy father is our ruin. Oh begone, man, or the sight of you will kill us both." "At that he fell at her knees; kissed, and wept over her cold hand, and, in his pity and despair, offered to cross the seas with her and her child, and so repair the wrong he had done her. "Tempt me not," she sobbed. "Go: leave me. None here shall ever know thy crime, but she whose heart thou hast broken, and ruined her good name." He took her in his arms, in spite of her resistance, and kissed her passionately; but, for the first time, she shuddered at his embrace, and that gave him the power to leave her. He rushed from her, all but distracted, and rode away to Cumberland; but not to tell the truth to Kate, if he could possibly help it. CHAPTER III At this particular time, no man's presence was more desired in that county than Griffith Gaunt's.