"Of a prominent resident in my parish--yes." "But she herself was conspicuous in parochial work? Is it a fact that she played the organ in church?" "It is." The fact was noted, the pen laid down; and the little old man, who looked only great across his desk, leant back in his chair. "I am exceedingly anxious that you should have fair play. Let me say plainly that these are not my first inquiries into the matter. I am informed--I wish to know with what truth--that the young woman disappeared for several months before her death?" "It is quite true." "And returned to give birth to her child?" "And to die!" said Carlton, in his grim determination neither to shield nor to spare himself in any of his answers. But his hands were clenched, and his white face glistened with his pain. The bishop watched him with an eye grown mild with understanding, and a heart hot with mercy for the man who had no mercy on himself. But the tight mouth never relaxed, and the peculiar voice was unaltered when it broke the silence. It was the voice of justice, neither kind nor unkind, severe nor lenient, only grave, deliberate, matter-of-fact. "My next question is dictated by information received, or let me say by suspicions communicated. It is a vital question; do not answer unless you like. It is, however, a question that will infallibly arise elsewhere. Were you, or were you not, privy to this poor young woman's disappearance?" "Before God, my lord, I was not!" "I understand that her parents had no idea where she was until the very end. Had you none either?" "No more than they had. We were equally in the dark. We believed that she had gone to stay with a friend from the village--a young woman who had married from service, and was settled near London. It was several weeks before we discovered that her friend had never seen her." "And all this time you did not suspect her condition?" "Yes; then I did; but not before." "She made no communication before she went away?" "None whatever to me--none whatever, to my knowledge." "And this was early in the year?" "She left Long Stow in January, and we had no news of her till the middle of June, when strangers communicated with her father." Again the bishop leant over his foolscap. "Did you ever offer her marriage?" he asked abruptly. "Repeatedly!" The clear eyes looked up. "Did you not tell her father this?" "No; I couldn't condescend to tell him," said Carlton, flushing for the first time. "My lord, I have made no excuses. There are none to make. That was none at all." His lordship regarded the changed face with no further change in his own. "So you loved her," he said softly, after a pause. "Ah! if only I had loved her more!" "If excuse there could be . . . love . . . is some." It was the old man murmuring, as old men will, all unknown to the bishop and the judge.