"Not quite everybody," dissented Mr. Butterby, listening with composure until she had finished. "_You_ didn't. I was in the churchyard when they put him into the ground, and heard and saw you over the grave." "But I had cause to--to--alter my opinion, later," she said, her face turning hectic with emotion. "Heaven alone knows how bitterly I have repented of that night's work! If cutting my tongue out afterwards, instead of before, could have undone my mistake----" "Now look here; don't you get flurried," interposed Mr. Butterby. "I didn't come here to put you out, but just to have a rational talk on a point or two. I thought at the time it was a suicide, as you may remember: but I'm free to confess that the way in which the ball has been kept rolling since has served to alter my opinion. Counsellor Ollivera was murdered!" She made no reply. Taking up her scissors, she began cutting away at the work at random, and the hectic red faded away to a sickly whiteness. "There was a stranger lodging at Mrs. Jones's at the time, you remember, one Godfrey Pitman. Helstonleigh said, you know, Miss Rye, that if anybody did it, it was him. That Godfrey Pitman is an uncommonly sharp card to have kept himself out of the way so long! Don't you think so?" "I don't think anything about it," she answered. "What is it to me?" "Well, Miss Rye, I've the pleasure of telling you that Godfrey Pitman's found!" The little presence of mind left in Alletha Rye seemed to quit her at the words. Perhaps she was no longer so capable of maintaining it as she once had been: the very best of our powers wear out when the soul's burthen is continued long and long. "Found!" she gasped, her hands falling on her work, her wild eyes turned to Mr. Butterby. "Leastways so near found, that it mayn't be a age afore he's took," added the detective, with professional craft. "Our friends in the blue coats have got the clue to him. I'd not lay you the worth of that silver thimble of yours, Miss Rye, that he's not standing in a certain dock next March assizes." "In what dock? What for?" came from her trembling lips. "Helstonleigh dock For what le did to Mr. Ollivera. Come, come, I did not want to frighten you like this, my good young woman. And why should it? It is not certain Pitman will be brought to trial, though he were guilty. Years have gone by since, and the Greatorexes and Parson Ollivera may hush it up. They are humane men; Mr. Bede especially." "_You_ don't believe Godfrey Pitman was guilty?" she exclaimed, and her eyes began to take a hard look, her voice a defiant tone. "Oh, don't I!" returned Butterby. "What's more to the purpose, Miss Rye, the London officers and their principals, who have got it in hand, believe it." "And what if I tell you that Godfrey Pitman never was guilty; that he never raised his hand against Mr. Ollivera?" she broke forth in passionate accents, rising to confront him. "What if I tell you that it was _I?_"