ed; even the smell of
antiseptics and ether had gone. We finally called the waiters in and
offered them four hundred each for their silence, or in the case of
Brathland's death--the surgeon held out hopes--a thousand. They coolly
replied they would take a thousand apiece before noon on the following
day, and ten thousand each in case of death. We--or rather Raglin and
one or two others--jawed for an hour; but the wretches never yielded an
inch. They had us on the hip and were not likely to be put off by any
amount of eloquence. Of course we caved in and God knows what amount of
future blackmail the Club is in for. Then there was the thousand for the
surgeon, and the nurse would expect a thousand more. Of course I made
myself responsible for the entire amount. Raglin insisted for a time
upon going halves--blood may be blood, but he had despised Bratty as
much as I ever did--but of course I would not hear of it.

"The next afternoon the surgeon probed again, and Brathland died under
the ether. The wound after probing looked sufficiently like an ordinary
incision to deceive any one. Raglin and Harold Lorcutt--who, of course,
was told the truth--naturally had the body sealed up in lead before
taking it north. The old duke and the women of the family are in a fair
way to know nothing."

He paused abruptly and lifted his eyes once more to Gwynne's, bursting
into a laugh that sounded like the crackling of fire under dry leaves.

"Lovely story, ain't it?"

But Gwynne made no reply. His mind, released, was working abnormally,
and his face was as livid as his cousin's had been.

Zeal rose. The narrative had excited him out of his apathy and physical
exhaustion, the confession shaken the rigidity from his mind. He planted
himself on the hearth-rug with an air that approached nonchalance. His
thin clever face had a burning spot on either cheek, his sunken eyes
were no longer haunted, but brilliant and staring; his thin high nose
and fine hands twitched slightly, as if his nerves were enjoying a too
sudden release.

"Heavenly sensation--to be a murderer. What beastly names things have
and how we are obsessed by them! The word rings in my brain night and
day--I haven't slept three hours since it happened, and I never had the
remotest hope that he would live. It's the second time in my life I've
been up against a cold ugly fact that stands by itself in a region where
rhetoric doesn't enter. I believe I could tolerate the situati