"I believe I do know as much as you." There was a tremor in her voice and an anxious pleading look in her eyes. This look maddened me. Why should she plead to me unless she was guilty? I stamped my foot upon the rock without noticing that in so doing I kicked our whole collection of shells into the water. There was something more to ask, but I stood silent and sullen. The woods above the beach were choral with bird-voices. They were hateful to me. The sea song of the tumbling waves was hideous. I cursed the yellow sunset light glaring on their snowy crests. A tiny hand was laid upon my arm. I writhed under its deadly if delicious touch. But I could not put it away, nor keep from turning to the sweet face beside me, to mark once more its mute appeal--now more than mere appeal; it was supplication that was in her eyes. Her red lips were parted as though they voiced an unspoken prayer. At last a prayer did pass from them to me. "Do not judge me until you know me better. Do not hate me without cause. I am not wicked, as you think. I--I--I am trying to do what I think is right. At least, I am not selfish or cruel. Trust me yet a little while." I looked at her one moment, and then with a sob I clasped her in my arms, and cried aloud: "My God! to name murder and that angel face in one breath! Child, you have been befooled. You know nothing." For a second she lingered in my embrace. Then she gently put away my arms, and looking up at me, said fearlessly but sorrowfully: "I cannot lie--even for your love. I know _all_." CHAPTER VIII. THE WOKING MYSTERY. She knew all. Then she was a murderess--or in sympathy with murderers. My arms fell from her. I drew back shuddering. I dared not look in her lying eyes, which cried pity when her base heart knew no mercy. Surely now I had solved the maddening puzzle which the character of this girl had, so far, presented to me. Yet the true solution was as far from me as ever. Indeed, I could not well have been further from it than at that moment. As we walked back, Natalie made two or three unsuccessful attempts to lure me out of the silence which was certainly more eloquent on my part than any words I could have used. Once she commenced: "It is hard to explain--" I interrupted her harshly. "No explanation is possible." On that she put her handkerchief to her eyes, and a half-suppressed sob shook her slight figure. Her grief distracted me. But what could I say to assuage it? At the hall door I stopped and said, "Good-bye." "Are you not coming in?" There was a directness and emphasis in the question which did not escape me. "I?" The horror in my own voice surprised myself, and assuredly did not pass without her notice. "Very well; good-bye. We are not exactly slaves of convention here, but you are too far advanced in that direction even for me. This is your second startling departure from us. I trust you will spare me the humiliation entailed by the condescension of your further acquaintance."