His voice broke for an instant with an emotion which every one who has ever loved can at least partially understand. “Good Heavens! to think that such an impulse should entangle me in such a charge!” he added, when he could speak again. “Well,” he resumed, after a long sigh, “I left the arbor,—my heart as innocent and happy as any heart in the world,—I climbed over the fence and went down the hill. That is the last time that I was in those grounds that day. That is the whole truth, so help me God!” The lawyer seemed touched. Even then, however, he was saying to himself, “They always keep back something, if not everything.” After meditating for a few seconds, he resumed his interrogatory. “Did any one see you? did Miss Barron see you, as you passed through the garden?” “I think not. Some one called her just as I left her, and she went, I believe, up stairs.” “Did you see the person who called? Did you see any one?” “No one. But the voice was a woman’s voice. I took it to be that of a servant.” Mr. Patterson fell into a thoughtful silence, his arms resting on the elbows of his chair, and his anxious eyes wandering over the floor. “But what motive?” broke out Foster, addressing the lawyer as if he were an accuser and an enemy,—“what sufficient motive had I for such a hideous crime?” “Ah! that is just it. The motive! They will make a great deal of that. Why, you must be able to guess what is alleged. Miss Lauson had made a will in her niece’s favor, but had threatened to disinherit her if she married you. This fact,—as has been made known by an incautious admission of Miss Bessie Barron,—this fact you were aware of. The death came just in time to prevent a change in the will. Don’t you see the obvious inference of the prosecution?” “Good Heavens!” exclaimed Foster, springing up and pacing his cell. “I murder a woman,—murder my wife’s aunt,—for money,—for twenty thousand dollars! Am I held so low as that? Why, it is a sum that any clever man can earn in this country in a few years. We could have done without it. I would not have asked for it, much less murdered for it. Tell me, Mr. Patterson, do you suppose me capable of such degrading as well as such horrible guilt?” “Mr. Foster,” replied the lawyer, with impressive deliberation, “I shall go into this case with a confidence that you are absolutely innocent.” “Thank you,” murmured the young man, grasping Patterson’s hand violently, and then turning away to wipe a tear, which had been too quick for him. “Excuse my weakness,” he said, presently. “But I don’t believe any worthy man is strong enough to bear the insult that the world has put upon me, without showing his suffering.”