“So you’re talking against me behind my back, are you?” asked Trafton, looking from one to the other with a scowl. His wife rose to her feet and turned upon him a glance such as he had never met before. “What have you done with Robert, John Trafton?” she demanded sternly. “Oh! that’s it, is it?” he said, laughing shortly. “I’ve served him as he deserved.” “What have you done with him?” she continued in a slow, measured voice. “You needn’t come any tragedy over me, old woman!” he answered with annoyance. “I left him on Egg Island to punish him for disobeying me!” “I charge you with his murder!” she continued, confronting him with a courage quite new to her. “Murder!” he repeated, starting. “Come, now, that’s a little too strong! Leaving him on Egg Island isn’t murdering him. You talk like a fool!” “Trafton,” said Ben Bence gravely, “there is reason to think that your nephew put off from the island on a raft, which he made himself, and that the raft went to pieces.” For the first time John Trafton’s brown face lost its color. “You don’t mean to say Bob’s drowned?” he ejaculated. “There is reason to fear that he may be.” “I’ll bet he’s on the island now.” “We have just been there and he is not there.” At length Trafton began to see that the situation was a grave one, and he began to exculpate himself. “If he was such a fool as to put to sea on a crazy raft it ain’t my fault,” he said. “I couldn’t help it, could I?” “If you hadn’t left him there he would still be alive and well.” John Trafton pulled out his red cotton handkerchief from his pocket and began to wipe his forehead, on which the beads of perspiration were gathering. “Of course I wouldn’t have left him there if I’d known what he would do,” he muttered. “Did you mean to leave him there all night?” asked Bence. “Yes, I meant it as a lesson to him,” said the fisherman. “A lesson to him? You are a fine man to give a lesson to him! You, who spend all your earnings for drink and leave me to starve! John Trafton, I charge you with the death of poor Robert!” exclaimed Mrs. Trafton with startling emphasis. Perhaps nothing more contributed to overwhelm John Trafton than the wonderful change which had taken place in his usually gentle and submissive wife. He returned her accusing glance with a look of deprecation. “Come now, Jane, be a little reasonable,” he said. “You’re very much mistaken. It was only in fun I left him. I thought it would be a good joke to leave him on the island all night. Say something for me, Ben--there’s a good fellow.” But Ben Bence was not disposed to waste any sympathy on John Trafton. He was glad to see Trafton brought to judgment and felt like deepening his sense of guilt rather than lightening it. “Your wife is right,” he said gravely. “If poor Bob is dead, you are guilty of his death in the sight of God.”