uestioning her.

She swore that she had loved him, that she had quite done with the
other when she married him, had been true to him in thought and deed
ever since their marriage. But she had been tempted two or three
times, through her aunt. Mr. Barradine had desired that she should
understand with what affection he always regarded her, and he invited
her to meet him; and it was the knowledge that he had come to covet
her again that made her sure she could get him to do anything for her.
At the same time the knowledge terrified her; and when Dale's trouble
began, and things with him seemed to be going from bad to worse, she
felt as if a sort of waking nightmare was drawing nearer and nearer.

She wrote to Mr. Barradine, simply asking him to exert this influence
on behalf of her husband; and the reply--the letter that she tore
up--was in these words: "I will do what I can; but why don't you come
and ask me yourself?" Of course she knew what that meant.

It was at the railway station, when bidding Dale good-by, that she
made up her mind to save him at all costs. When he refused to act on
Ridgett's advice, when he showed himself so firm, so unyielding, she
knew that he was a man going to his doom, unless she could avert the
doom.

"And, Will--believe it or not--no woman ever loved a husband truer
than I loved you at that moment. To see you there so brave and strong
and good--and yet certain sure to ruin yourself! Well, I couldn't bear
it. And if it was to do again, I'd do it."

Slowly he withdrew his hands from her throat, and clasped them
together with all his strength. Turning for a moment, he glanced at
the open window. The space seemed to have contracted and darkened, so
that it looked black and small as a square grave cut out for a child.
But if not by the window, what other end to it all would he find? He
could not go on like this--with a to-morrow and a day after, and weeks
and months to follow.

He turned, and in speaking to her, unconsciously used her name.

"Could you think, Mavis, I cared for my job better'n my honor?"

"I thought you'd never know. And I loved you, Will--only you--no one
else."

He scarcely seemed to listen to the answer. He turned from her again;
and went on talking, as if to himself or the far-off stars, or the
invisible powers that mold men's destinies.

"'Aardn't I my fingers and brains--to work for you? Would I care--so's
you could be what I thought you were--whether I broke my