With his foot he pushed back the burning wood.  “I did not kill him in self-defence.  I killed him in anger.  That is murder.  Say, for argument, that it is confessed murder.  I will tell you, as a lawyer, what that means.  It means a full stop.  Life stopped, work stopped, fame stopped—­a period black as ink, and never to be erased!  A stop deep as the grave and sharp as the hangman’s drop, and the record that it closes empty, vile, read at the best with horror and pity, read at the worst with a glance aside at every man and woman whom the stained hand had ever touched!  That is what would come if I followed this appearance.”  He struck the hand at which he looked against the mantel-shelf.  “And if he says, ‘Ay, Lewis Rand, it is so that I would do,’ I will answer, ’Yes! being you!—­but what, Ludwell Cary, had you lain in my cradle?” His face worked and he turned from the mantel to the great chair.  “Oh, mother!” he said beneath his breath.

Jacqueline came and knelt beside him.  “Lewis, Lewis, is it all so dark?”

He touched her hair with his fingers.  “Dark!  I feel as though I were in a bare, light place.  Underground, you know, but bare and flooded with light.  Well, Jacqueline, well—­”

She clung to him without speech, and he went on.  “There is enough to create suspicion.  We were travelling at the same hour, and it is known that we were opponents.  The crossroads where I slept last night—­there was nothing, I think, said at the inn.  Then the forge, and the mill.  At the mill they will swear to telling me that he took the main road, and since they could not see the ford, they must suppose that I, too, went that way.  The main road.  There’s the insistence.  I kept to the main road.  As for Young Isham, I can manage him.  That old Frenchman is more difficult.  Danger there—­unless he holds his tongue.  There’s a witness indeed lying at the bottom of some pool below the strand, but the strand may sink into the sea before that witness is found!  There is this and there is that, but they’ll serve no warrant on the this and that the world can see.  I have won more difficult cases.”

“You propose,” she cried, “to lie—­and lie—­and lie!”

After a moment he answered, with bitterness, “I am not unreasonable.  I do not match white with black.  The dyer’s hand accepts the hue it works in.  I’ll not win rest, forgiveness, sleep!  But, by God, I’ll keep what men care for.  I’ll keep strength and reputation, name, and room to work a lever in!  Ay, and I’ll not endure the world to say, ’This was his friend, and that his lover; look how they are stained!’ O God, O God!”

She put her arms around him.  “There is no stain!  I will forever love you.  Love casts off soil as it casts out fear.  Will you not come with me—­and tell them?”

He sat for some minutes, still in her clasp, then, leaning forward, took her face in his hands and kissed her on the brow.  “No!” he said, with finality.