"She stopped abruptly, and rose slowly to her feet. Her eyes were cast down shamefacedly, and she bit her lip. She lifted her hand to her throat, and felt the diamonds there. Then, with an apprehensive, almost a cowering glance, she peered stealthily round through the trees, as though expecting to see something that she dreaded. Finally she turned again, appealingly, to me, but said nothing. "I thought I partly understood the significance of this dumb-show. She was subject to these somnambulistic trances, and was ashamed of them. She knew not, on this occasion, what extravagance she might have committed in the presence of me, her lover. She feared the construction I might put upon it, yet was too timid--or, it might be, too proud--to speak. But her misgiving did me injustice. Shocked and grieved though I was, I loved her more than ever. "'You were faint, my dear, that's all,' I said, cheerfully and affectionately. 'I brought you under this tree, and now you're all right.' "She shook her head, with a piteous smile. 'I know what has been the matter with me, Mr. Gainsborough,' she said, with an attempt at reserve and coldness in her tone. 'I had hoped I might have parted from you before you knew, but--it was not to be so! It is very good of you to pretend to ignore it, and I thank you--I thank you. Here,' she added, nervously unclasping the necklace and removing the earrings, 'I have worn these too long. Take them, please.' "'Kate, you shall wear them forever!' cried I, passionately. "'I must not begin yet, at all events,' she returned more firmly. 'Take them, please, or you will make me feel more humiliated than I do now.' She put them in my unwilling hands. 'And now we'll get our hats and go back to the hotel,' she continued, with a smile which was pathetic in its effort to seem indifferent and unconstrained. 'Where are they? Ah!' "She had just caught sight of her white hat lying beside the stump on the farther side of the gorge. The suppressed scream and the start indicated that she now for the first time realised by what a perilous path she had come hither. She remained for a moment gazing at the beam with a sort of fascination; then, moving forward to the brink, looked down the sheer precipice to the rocks below. "'I wish I had fallen!' she said, almost below her breath; 'or,' she added, after a short pause, in a tone still lower, but of intense emphasis, 'I wish he had!' "'You wish I had?' "'I did not know you were so near,' she answered, drawing back from the verge. 'No, no--not you! Come, we must walk round this place. Tell me,' she said, facing me suddenly, 'did you see anyone?' "'I think not. I fancied I heard----' "'We must get back to the hotel,' she interrupted excitedly; 'at least, I must get back. I don't like to be here. I wish you would leave me. I would rather say good-bye to you here than there.'