"I don't have to. The law has to prove my guilt. I won't run away, that's flat! Anyone who thinks that I fired on a man sitting unarmed in a sleigh is a fool!" He stood his snowshoes behind the door and pulled off his heavy outer coat. The girl turned back to the stove. The grandfathers came in with the milk pails. Flora did not speak a dozen words during supper. Mrs. Ducat returned to her husband immediately after supper, the old men fell to arguing and smoking beside the stove, and Jim and Flora washed the dishes. Flora washed and Jim dried. The girl was nervous and the young man was decidedly cool. He wasn't worrying about the possible effect upon himself of the assault upon Amos Hammond, but he was hurt and disappointed and offended at the thought that this girl, his friend, could for a moment believe him capable of firing on an unarmed man. "Will you go to-night?" she asked, clattering the dishes in the pan. "I have it all planned for you and everything ready." "No, I won't!" "Then I have to go myself," she whispered, with bowed head and averted face. "You, Flora? What are you thinking of? Why should you go?" "To get away! To escape!" "What are you talking about?" She turned her head and looked at him with a flushed face and eyes flashing green through tears. "Flora, what do you mean?" he continued. "Why did you say that?" "I--I must get away--before morning--from the police!" "You? Stop crying or I'll shake you! What have the police to do with you?" "I--I did it. I shot Amos Hammond." "You! You are mad, Flora! You knew nothing about it until this afternoon. You knew nothing until Steeves told you." "I pretended not to know, naturally. I wasn't in when you got home before dinner, was I? I came in fifteen or twenty minutes after you. You noticed that, Jim. I shot him. I was in the woods, and I saw him suddenly on the road--and I shot him!" "Good Lord! Why?" "I thought of poor old Widow Wilson, and of the time he tried to kill you, and of things he has said about us." "Good heavens!" "So you see, I must get away--before morning." Jim dried three cups in silence. "I'll go," he said, his voice low but steady. "Tell me what you have planned after the old boys have turned in: and I'll get away before dawn." "But you said you didn't do it!" "Well?" "Why--why have you changed your mind about going?" "To give the sheriff a run for his money. All you will have to do is keep quiet. You would be safe enough from suspicion without my going, I think, but you'll be doubly safe if I take to the woods." "Do you believe that of me?" "What?" "That I shot Amos Hammond?" "Haven't you just now told me that you shot him? I don't know what you are trying to get at! Did you shoot him, or didn't you?" "You should know." "I believe what you tell me, mad as it sounds." "Of course I did it. Haven't I told you so? I wonder what you must think of me--for doing such a thing."