"Yes, I sent for you," said the prisoner, eagerly. "I have wronged you and would make reparation before--before to-morrow." The fire of rage and hatred that flared up in the listener's eyes was dreadful to behold. "You lied to me--how dared you do it?" he exclaimed, hoarsely. "Did I not say I would have your life if I found you out?" "The few hours of life that remain to me are not worth your vengeance," was the quiet reply. "Sit down, Captain Ernscliffe, I would speak to you of your wife." He pointed to a chair, but the visitor shook his head. "No, I prefer standing. I can scarcely breathe the same air with you, Leon Vinton! Speak quickly." "Do not look on me as your enemy now, Captain Ernscliffe," said the prisoner, deprecatingly. "I stand apart from my fellow-men as a condemned criminal about to be executed. "Think of me as a wretched sinner trying to make peace with those whom I have wronged that I may plead for pardon before my offended God." Captain Ernscliffe bowed silently, and the angry flash in his dark eyes faded out at the melancholy tone and air of the frightened and wretched criminal. "I lied to you when I told you that I did not marry Queenie Lyle," said Leon Vinton, looking down and speaking in a low, hoarse voice. "The day she ran away with me I married her, and the certificate was placed in her hands. "She thought she was my wife, but the pretended minister who performed the ceremony was only a boon companion of mine who had served me before in such an accommodating manner. "It was the merest farce, but Queenie thought she was my legal wife. "She would not have gone with me else. She was as pure and innocent as an angel." He paused a moment, but he did not look up. He could not bear to meet the tiger glare in the eyes of the man before him. Clearing his throat nervously, he continued: "I lived with her a year, and then we mutually wearied of each other. "Her keen intuition soon showed her that she had been deceived in me, and that I was far different from the ideal which she had placed on a lofty pedestal and worshiped for awhile as a god among men. "She scorned me then, and I hated her because she had found me out. In my rage I told her the truth, and then I tried to kill her." "My God!" Captain Ernscliffe muttered, clenching his hands as though he would have torn the villain limb from limb. "I thought I had killed her," pursued Vinton. "I strangled her with both my hands. "I threw her down and trampled upon her beautiful face that had been her ruin. "I hurriedly dug her a shallow grave, covered her over with the wet earth and leaves, and hastened back to the cottage by the river where we had lived together." "Fiend!" thundered Captain Ernscliffe, springing furiously upon him. The prisoner, chained as he was, could offer no resistance to his infuriated assailant. He did not even utter a cry.