It was a false alarm," Ballard explained, when he rejoined his
companion at the derrick's foot. "Jerry has an aggravated attack of
imaginationitis. You were saying----?"

"I wasn't saying anything; but I shall begin now--if you'll sit down.
You must be dying to know why we came down here to-night, of all the
nights that ever were; and why we are staying so long past our welcome."

"I never felt less like dying since the world began; and you couldn't
outstay your welcome if you should try," he answered, out of a full
heart. "My opportunities to sit quietly in blissful nearness to you
haven't been so frequent that I can afford to spoil this one with
foolish queryings about the whys and wherefores."

"Hush!" she broke in imperatively. "You are saying light things again in
the very thick of the miseries! Have you forgotten that to-day--a few
hours ago--another attempt was made upon your life?"

"No; I haven't forgotten," he admitted.

"Be honest with me," she insisted. "You are not as indifferent as you
would like to have me believe. Do you know who made the attempt?"

"Yes." He answered without realising that the single word levelled all
the carefully raised barriers of concealment; and when the realisation
came, he could have bitten his tongue for its incautious slip.

"Then you doubtless know who is responsible for all the terrible
happenings; the--the _crimes_?"

Denial was useless now, and he said "Yes," again.

"How long have you known this?"

"I have suspected it almost from the first."

She turned upon him like some wild creature at bay.

"Why are you waiting? Why haven't you had him arrested and tried and
condemned, like any other common murderer?"

He regarded her gravely, as the hard, white moonlight permitted. No man
ever plumbs a woman's heart in its ultimate depths; least of all the
heart of the woman he knows best and loves most.

"You seem to overlook the fact that I am his daughter's lover," he said,
as if the simple fact settled the matter beyond question.

"And you have never sought for an explanation?--beyond the one which
would stamp him as the vilest, the most inhuman of criminals?" she went
on, ignoring his reason for condoning the crimes.

"I have; though quite without success, I think--until to-day."

"But to-day?" she questioned, anxiously, eagerly.

He hesitated, picking and choosing among the words. And in the end he
merely begged her to help him. "To-day, hope led me over int