She did not want to excite the girl any further now, though she determined that in the end she should yield to her mother's will. Rising from her seat, she quitted the room like a skillful general, though casting one single glance backward that rankled reproachfully in Geraldine's heart. CHAPTER XXXVII. "A WOMAN'S HONOR IS INVOLVED, AND MY SILENCE IS ITS ONLY SAFEGUARD." "Woman's honor is nice as ermine-- Will not bear a soil." "Her maiden pride, her haughty name, My dumb devotion shall not shame; The love that no return doth crave, To knightly levels lifts the slave." When Clifford Standish plunged the dagger into Hawthorne's breast, and heard the groan of the victim, felt the hot blood spurting over his hands as he rolled over in the snow, he thought he had killed him. But no pang of remorse touched his cruel heart. He exulted in the deed that he had done. Springing to his feet, he glanced hurriedly around, and seeing no one near, coolly wiped his bloody hands on Hawthorne's overcoat, and hastened away, exclaiming: "I am rid of my dangerous rival at last!" But there had been an unsuspected witness of the deadly crime he had committed. From a window above a young man had been looking down just as the rivals closed in mortal combat. He had come to the place to call on a friend who roomed there, and learned that he was out, but was told that he would be in directly. Without removing his hat and overcoat, he walked restlessly up and down the room, and at last became so impatient that he pushed up the window and looked out to see if his friend was yet in sight. But the narrow street, its snowy expanse lighted by the flaring electric lights, was deserted, save by two men, who hurled themselves with tremendous force against each other in deadly conflict. Mr. Hill was not alarmed at first. He smiled, and murmured, whimsically: "Whew! A prize-fight! I bet on the one that whips!" Oblivious of the cold air that rushed through the open window into his friend's warm steam-heated apartment, he leaned out and watched the contest, adding: "I don't suppose they would thank me for spoiling their sport, so I won't interfere. It's the blue-coat's business to break it up, but they're never in place when needed." The battle went on, and the unseen witness gazed admiringly at the well-pitted antagonists. He was a jovial young fellow, and he really felt inclined to cheer the gallant athletes, so cleverly did they handle each other. But he restrained his inclination, and continued his watching, and wondering who the combatants were and which would gain the mastery. But all at once he uttered a startled cry: "Heavens! that was murder!" He had heard the ripping sound of the dagger pressed upward into the victim's breast, and his dying groan as he rolled over in the snow. Starting away from the window, he ran away from the room into the hall, eager to make his way into the street.