, if only you'll make it worth while. Will you?" he pleaded.

"Oh, the wonder of it!" she whispered, gazing on him with parted lips.
But he did not understand, yet. He pressed what he thought to be his
advantage.

"Here," he cried, suddenly dropping her hands and catching up the bills
from the valise. "Here's safety. Here's life. For you and your sister,
both. You spoke of Providence a moment ago. Here's Providence for you!
Quick! Take it."

"What is it?" she asked, drawing away as he sought to thrust the money
into her hands.

"Twenty thousand dollars. More. It doesn't matter. It's life for both of
you. Have you the right to refuse it? Take it and go."

She let the bank-notes fall from her hands unnoticed.

"Do you think I would leave you _now_?" she cried in a voice of thrilled
music. "Even if they weren't sure to trace me, as they would be."

This last she uttered as an unimportant matter dismissed with
indifference.

"There will be nothing to trace. My confession will cover the ground."

"Confession? To what?"

"To the murder of Ely Crouch."

Some sort of sound I was conscious of making. I suppose I gasped. But
they were too engrossed to hear.

"You would do even that? But the penalty--the shame--"

"What do they matter to a dying man?" he retorted impatiently.

She had fallen back from him, in the shock of his suggestion, but now
she came forward again slowly, her glorious eyes fixed on his. So they
stood face to face, soul to soul, deep answering unto deep, and, as I
sit here speaking, I saw the wonder and the miracle flower in her face.
When she spoke again, her words seemed the inevitable expression of that
which had passed silently between them.

"Do you love me?"

"Before God I do," he answered.

"Take me away! There's time yet. I'll go with you anywhere, anywhere!
I'm all yours. I've loved you from the first, I think, as you have loved
me. All I ask is to live for you, and when you die, to die with you."

Fire flashed from his face at the call. He took a step toward her. A
shout, half-muffled, sounded from outside the window. Instantly the
light and passion died in his eyes. I have never seen a face at once so
stern and so gentle as his was when he caught the outreaching hands
in his own.

"You forget that they must find one of us, or it's all no use. Listen
carefully, dear one. If you truly love me, you must do as I bid you.
Give me my chance of fooling fate; of making my death worth