ething that had
horrified her to the soul.

But now of course there was no longer any room for doubt. She had heard
everything and the question was what that knowledge, lodged in her
brain, might mean to him and to his friends.

Just for a moment the frozen, misty atmosphere took on a reddish hue,
his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth, a cold sweat broke out upon
his forehead.

He looked around him furtively, fearfully, wondering whence came that
hideous, insinuating whisper which was freezing the marrow in his bones.
No doubt that had she spoken then, had she reproached or adjured, he
would have found it impossible to regain mastery over himself. But she
looked so unimpassioned, so still, so detached, that self-control came
back to him, and for the moment she was safe.

"Will you tell me what you did hear?" he asked after awhile, with
seeming calm, though he felt as if his words must choke him, and her
answer strike him dead.

"I heard," she said, speaking very slowly and very quietly, "that the
Lord of Stoutenburg has returned, and is trying to drag you and others
into iniquity to further his own ambitious schemes."

"You wrong him there, Gilda. The Lord of Stoutenburg has certain wrongs
to avenge which cry aloud to Heaven."

"We will not argue about that, Nicolaes," she said coldly. "Murder is
hideous, call it what you will. The brand of Cain doth defame a man and
carries its curse with it. No man can justify so dastardly a crime. 'Tis
sophistry to suggest it."

"Then in sending Barneveld to the scaffold did the Prince of Orange call
that curse upon himself, a curse which--please the God of
vengeance!--will come home to him now at last."

"'Tis not for you, Nicolaes, to condemn him, who has heaped favours,
kindness, bounties upon our father and upon us. 'Tis not for you, the
Stadtholder's debtor for everything you are, for everything that you
possess, 'tis not for you to avenge Barneveld's wrongs."

"'Tis not for you, my sister," he retorted hotly, "to preach to me your
elder brother. I alone am responsible for mine actions, and have no
account to give to any one."

"You owe an account of your actions to your father and to me, Nicolaes,
since your dishonour will fall upon us too."

"Take care, Gilda, take care!" he exclaimed hoarsely, "you speak of
things which are beyond your ken, but in speaking them you presume on my
forebearance ... and on your sex."

"There is no one in sight," she said calm