I wondered if she thought of the chill of the water in which she had plunged the little child. I looked at her; there was not even a fleeting shadow on her face. Then she lingered for half a minute by my side. As she drew near to me, I felt again that it was utterly impossible that my suspicions could be correct, and that I must be mistaken. "I hope," she said, "you will not think what I am going to say strange. I know that it is the custom for some wives to be jealous of their husband's friends--some might be jealous of you. I want to tell you that I am not one of that kind. I love my husband so utterly, so entirely, that all whom he loves are dear to me. You are a brother, friend, everything to him--will you be the same to me?" A beautiful woman asking, with those sweet, sensitive lips, for my friendship, looking at me with those calm, tender eyes, asking me to like her for her husband's sake--the sweetest, the most gracious, the most graceful picture I had ever seen. Yet, oh, Heaven! a murderess, if ever there was one! She wondered why I did not respond to her advances. I read the wonder in her face. "You do not care for hasty friends," she said. "Well, Lance and I are one; if you like him, you must like me, and time will show." "You are more than good to me," I stammered, thinking in my heart if she had been but half as good to the little helpless child she flung into the sea. I have never seen a woman more charming--of more exquisite grace--of more perfect accomplishment--greater fascination of manner. She sang to us, and her voice was full of such sweet pathos it almost brought the tears in my eyes. I could not reconcile what I saw now with what I had seen on the Chain Pier, though outwardly the same woman I had seen on the Chain Pier and this graceful, gracious lady could not possibly be one. As the evening passed on, and I saw her bright, cheerful ways, her devotion to her husband, her candid, frank open manner, I came to the conclusion that I must be the victim either of a mania or of some terrible mistake. Was it possible, though, that I could have been? Had I not had the face clearly, distinctly, before me for the past three years?