ked him for it.

I paid him his wages then and there, gave him a present and a good
testimonial and discharged him. He wept real tears and shook with sobs
of grief--easy grief, but very genuine.

When Dolores came home from the Bandstand I said quietly: "Show me the
jewellery Burker sent you, Dolly. I am very much in earnest, so don't
bluster."

She seemed about to faint and looked very frightened--perhaps my face
was more expressive than a gentleman's should be.

"It was only a little thing for my birthday," she whined. "Can't I keep
it? Don't be a tyrant or a fool."

"Your next birthday or your last?" I asked. "Please get it at once.
We'll settle matters quietly and finally."

I fear the poor girl had visions of the doorstep and a closed door. Two,
perhaps, for I am sure Burker would not have taken her in if I had
turned her out, and she may have thought the same.

It was a diamond ring, and the scoundrel must have given a couple of
months' pay for it--if he had paid for it at all. I thrust aside the
sudden conviction that Burker's own taste could not have been
responsible for its choice and that it was selected by my wife.

"Why should he give you this, Dolores?" I asked. "Will you tell me or
must I go to him?" And then she burst into tears and flung herself at my
feet, begging for mercy.

Mercy!

_Qui s'excuse s'accuse_.

What should I do?

To cast her out was to murder her soul quickly and her body slowly, and
I could foresee her career with prophetic eye and painful clearness.

And what could the Law do for me?

Publish our shame and perhaps brand me that wretched thing--the
willingly deceived and complaisant husband.

What could I do by challenging Burker?

He was a champion man-at-arms, a fine boxer, and a younger, stronger
man, I should merely experience humiliation and defeat. What _could_ I
do?

If I said, "Go and live with your Burker," I should be committing a
bigger crime than hers, for if he did take her in, it would not be for
long.

I sat the night through, pondered the question carefully, looked at it
from all points of view and--decided that Burker must die. Also that he
must not drag me to jail or the scaffold as he went to his doom. If I
shot him and was punished, Dolores would become a--well, as I have said,
her soul would die quickly and her body slowly. I had married Dolores
and I must do what lay in my power to protect Dolores. But I simply
could not kill the hound in so