"It was, indeed," said Steel, gravely. "I saw you come down, I saw you
peep in--all dread and reluctance! I saw you recoil, I saw the face with
which you shut those doors and put out the lights. And afterwards I
learned from the medical evidence that your husband must have been dead
at that time; one thing I knew, and that was that he was not shot during
the next hour and more, for I waited about until half-past two in the
hope that he would come out. I was not going to ring and bring you down
again, for I had seen your face, and I still saw your light upstairs."

"So you thought I had come down to see my handiwork!"

"To see if he was really dead. Yes, I thought that afterwards. I could
not help thinking it, Rachel."

"Did it never occur to you that I might have thought he was asleep?"

"Yes, that has struck me since."

"You have not thought me guilty all along, then?"

"Not all along."

"Did you right through my trial?"

"God forgive me--yes, I did! And there was one thing that convinced me
more than anything else; that was when you told the jury that the
occasion of your final parting upstairs was the last time you saw poor
Alec alive."

"But it was," said Rachel. "I remember the question. I did not know how
to answer it. I could not tell them I had seen him dead but fancied him
only asleep; that they would never have believed. So I told the simple
truth. But it upset me dreadfully."

"That I saw. You expected cross-examination."

"Yes; and I did not know whether to stick to the truth or to lie!"

"I can read people sometimes," Steel continued after a pause. "I guessed
your difficulty. Surely you must see the only conceivable inference?"

"I did see it."

"And, seeing, do you not forgive?"

"Yes, that. But you married me while you still thought me guilty. I
forgive you for denying it at the time. I suppose that was necessary.
But you have not yet told me why you did it."

"Honestly, Rachel, it was largely fascination--"

"But not primarily."

"No."

"Then let me hear the prime motive at last, for I am tired of trying to
guess it!"

Steel stood before his wife as he had never stood before her yet, his
white head bowed, his dark eyes lowered, hands clasped, shoulders bent,
the suppliant and the penitent in one.

"I did it to punish you," he said. "I thought some one must--I felt I
could have hanged you if I had spoken out what I had seen--and
I--married you instead!"

His eyes were on the