a light in which it has never presented itself to me
before. I must prove myself to myself before--before----" She broke
off, only to resume again with a fierce and passionate earnestness of
which Alice had never believed her capable. "I can never marry
George Iredale with Leslie's unavenged death upon my conscience. I
could never trust myself. George may love me now; I believe I love
him, but----No, Alice, I will never marry him until my duty to
Leslie Grey is fulfilled. This shall be my punishment for my
heartless forgetfulness."

Alice surveyed her friend for some seconds without speaking. Then she
burst out into a scathing protest--

"You are mad, Prue,--mad, mad, utterly mad. You would throw away a
life's happiness for the mere shadow of what you are pleased to
consider a duty. Worse, you would destroy a man's happiness for a
morbid phantasm. What can you do towards avenging Leslie's death? You
hold no clue. What the police have failed to fathom, how can you hope
to unravel? If I were a man, do you know what I'd do to you? I'd take
you by the shoulders and shake you until that foolish head of yours
threatened to part company with your equally foolish body. You should
have thought of these things before, and not now, when you realize how
fond you are of George, set about wrecking two healthy lives. Oh,
Prue, you are--are--a fool! And I can scarcely keep my temper with
you." Alice paused for want of breath and lack of vocabulary for
vituperation. Prudence was looking out across the water. Her
expression was quite unchanged. With all the warped illogicalness of
the feminine mind she had discovered the path in which she considered
her duty to lie, and was resolved to follow it.

"I have a better clue than you suppose, Alice," she said thoughtfully,
"the clue of his dying words. I understood his reference to the
Winnipeg _Free Press_. That must be the means by which the murderer is
discovered. They were not horse-thieves who did him to death. And I
will tell you something else. The notice in that paper to which he
referred--you know--is even now inserted at certain times. The man or
men who cause that notice to be inserted in the paper were in some way
responsible for his death."

There was a moment's pause. Then Alice spoke quite calmly.

"Tell me, Prue, has George proposed yet?"

"No."

"Ah!" And Alice smiled broadly and turned her eyes towards the
setting sun. When she spoke again it was to draw attention to