Then Amelia Jane had told her, as she was meant to do! It is easier to amplify bad news than to break it. He would strike at the hardest part first. “So you knew he was there!” he said, with a shudder that was not all put on. “Beryl, don’t look at me like that,” using her name as if he had used it many times to himself. “I know what you think--that only a selfish coward could have got away from that island and left a woman to be killed. But don’t judge me yet.” “Answer me!” she said fiercely. “What happened to Andria? You were with her last!” He nodded, but there was no shame on his face. “I was with her last,” he said slowly, “but--Heriot was with her first.” “What do you mean?” She drew a step nearer to him; another, and she would fly at his eyes. “Listen; be patient. I don’t know how to tell you, but if you will have it----” “Go on.” He saw the wild blood in her cheeks. “It was this,” he answered very low. “That man Heriot had been in love with her for a long time--may have been married to her for all I know. Anyhow, he followed her. I suppose she sent for him. I don’t know.” “How could she send, when we were told the place was Bermuda?” Beryl asked scornfully. “You were told that for your own safety. There were others besides Heriot who might have followed you,” he answered somberly. “Oh, I’m not defending my father! He made mistakes, but he meant well.” He dared not lift his eyes to the fierce-light gaze of hers, but he kept on steadily: “The man knew she was there; it doesn’t matter how. He hid in our house and crept away in the night rather than face us.” The girl deliberately turned her back to him. He had his eyes on the ground--anywhere but on her--and did not see her pull a flat thing out of her pocket, nor notice the rustle of the thin, foreign envelope that covered the carte de visite. “Look at that if you would doubt me!” Andria had said. She would look at it now. But when she saw and read she was struck dumb. No wonder Andria had feared to meet him. No wonder she had been livid with fury when he saw her. No wonder---- She wheeled and faced him, the photograph hidden in the folds of her wide silk belt. “I----” but she stopped the words on her very lips. Let him tell all his lies, let him think her a fool! No one could know better than he that Heriot was not Andria’s lover. “Perhaps he knew you,” she said, with an insolence for which he could have struck her, though he did not know all she meant. “Yes, he knew me. Knew me,” he answered slowly, “enough to know I would not have my father’s roof--or you--dishonored. But his fear drove him to his death, and hers, too.