demn yourself wrongly?
Why do you brood over a deed done in wrath, and under the strain that
few might resist, as it had been done in cold blood, and with a
murderer's malice and forethought of evil?"

The man listened to her gravely, with a kind of considerate patience in
the look of his face; waited a moment, when she had finished, as one
might wait from the habit of politeness, and then, without answering
her, said:

"You have not answered my question, old trapper."

"I can't answer it,--I sartinly can't answer it, friend, onless I know
the sarcumstances of the killin'; for there be killin' that be right and
there be killin' that be wrong, and onless I know the sarcumstances of
the killin', my words would be like the words of a boy that talks in
council without knowing what he is talkin'. Ef ye killed a man, how did
ye kill him?"

"I killed him face to face," answered the man. He paused a moment, and
then repeated, "Face to face."

"Why did ye kill him?" asked the trapper. "Had he done ye wrong?"

"He was my friend," said the man, "my friend, true and tried."

"Had he done ye a wrong?" persisted the trapper.

"What is wrong?" asked the man. "I can't tell whether he had done me
wrong or nay. I only know he had crossed my purpose,--stopped me from
doing what I had set my heart on doing; and what I set my heart on
doing, old man, _I do_." And the man's eyes darkened under the abundant
brow and the face tightened and contracted, as a rope when a strain is
upon it. "The man came between me and my purpose," he added, "he stood
up and faced me, and said I should not do what I proposed to do, and
should not have what I had sworn to have; and I killed him where he
stood."

It was astonishing how quietly the words were said, considering the
tremendous energy of will which was charged into and through their
quietness.

"He had no right to do it," said the girl; "he had no right to do it. It
was none of his business, and you know it wasn't," And she spoke,
apparently to the man, "Oh, sir, why do you not tell them that he was an
intermeddler, and meddled with what was none of his business,--kindled
you to rage by his meddling, and that you slew him in your rage,
thoughtlessly, unintentionally? Why do you not tell them these things?"

The man listened to her again, politely. There was a look of grave
courtesy in his eye as he half turned his face and looked upon her as
she was speaking; but beyond this there was no r