"Ah! Then depend upon it, Mr. Cass got rid of him. He married Miss Cass for her money--he must have been in great straits when he committed that forgery. Oh, I quite believe it was he who did it: he was wonderfully clever at imitating handwriting. I knew of that accomplishment long before I was married." "How you hate him!" Geoffrey could not help exclaiming. "I am a very good hater," she said, quietly; "and I have every reason to hate that man. It was he who got my husband dismissed, and it was certainly he who led him into dissipated ways; for Jenner was not a bad man during the early years of our married life. It was only when he came under Marshall's influence that he took to drink and began to treat me cruelly. Oh, I know what I owe him only too well! I should like to see him arrested for this murder, and hanged--hanged!" She spoke with such vehemence that Heron shivered. "I hope he will be proved innocent for all that," he said. "Remember I am engaged to his niece." "Miss Ruth is not his niece save by marriage." "Still, the disgrace----" "Well, leave the matter alone," said Mrs. Jenner, abruptly. "I have suffered so much that a little, more or less, does not matter. When I I am gone, there will be an end of all your trouble. Let Marshall live to repent, if he can. I am willing to die with the disgrace on me; I can't well be worse off than I am. And my son will soon forget me----" "You do him wrong, Mrs. Jenner; he loves you dearly. But, let this be as it may, what I have to do is to get at the truth of it all. If Marshall will confess his guilt, I will consult with Mr. Cass and see what is to be done. I confess, that on Ruth's account, I do not want a scandal." "Would you desert her?" "No, for I love her. And I am too just, I hope, to visit the sins of other people upon her innocent head." Mrs. Jenner seemed to be considering; then, "Mr. Heron," she said at last, "you are a good man. Leave the matter where it stands, and let me die a guilty woman in the eyes of the world. If I were in good health, I might speak differently but I am dying. Let me die. I have suffered so much, that now I could not even enjoy freedom. There is no rest for me but in the grave. Believe me, it is better to leave things as they are." "Well, we'll see about that. But tell me, how did the bill get inside the toy horse?" "Ah, that is difficult to explain! The horse belonged to my boy; he was playing with it before the fire on that evening. I left it there when I took the child to bed. It is likely enough," she went on, musingly, "that my husband, knowing he had driven Marshall into a corner, was afraid he might lose this bill. He may have sewn it up inside the horse when I was out of the room. He knew very well that I kept all my boy's toys, and he thought it would be safe there. No one would ever have dreamt of looking for it in such a hiding-place. It is really most wonderful, when one comes to think of it, that it has come to light at all."