‘Great heaven!’ cried Hugo, ’you’ve been through sufficient in your time!’

‘Yes.’  Camilla paused.  ’Mr. Ravengar cut down the body, searched the pockets, took out a paper, read it, and put it in his own pocket.  Then the old man’s lips twitched.  He was not quite dead, after all.  Mr. Ravengar stared at the face; and then, by means of putting a chair on a table and lifting Powitt on to the chair, he tied up the cord which he had cut, and left the poor old man to swing again.  It was an—­an interrupted suicide.’

She stopped once more, and Hugo fervently wished he had never asked her to begin.  He gazed at her set face with a fascinated glance.

‘All this time,’ she resumed, ’young Powitt had been crouching on the floor, and had seen nothing.’

‘And what did you do?’

’I fainted, and fell off my chair.  The noise startled Mr. Ravengar, and he came round into my room.  Young Powitt met him at the door, and, to explain his presence there, he said that he had come to see his brother.  Mr. Ravengar said:  “Your brother is in the next room.”  But instead of going into the next room, young Powitt ran off.  Then Mr. Ravengar perceived me on the floor.  My first words to him when I recovered consciousness were:  “Why did you hang him up again, Mr. Ravengar?” He was staggered.  He actually tried to justify himself, and said it was best for the old man—­the old man had wanted to die, and so on.  Mr. Ravengar certainly thought that young Powitt had seen what I had seen.  That very night young Powitt was arrested for another theft, from his own employers, and it was not till after his arrest that he learnt that his brother had committed suicide.  He got four years.  When he received sentence, he swore that he would kill Mr. Ravengar immediately he came out of prison.  I heard his threat.  I knew him, and I knew that he meant it.  He argued that Mr. Ravengar’s financial operations had ruined thousands of people, including his brother and himself.

’But the inquest on old Powitt—­I seem to remember about it.  Why didn’t you give evidence?’

’Because I was ill with brain-fever.  When I recovered, all was finished.  What was I to do?  I warned Mr. Ravengar that young Powitt meant to kill him.  He laughed.  Of course, I left him.  It is my belief that Mr. Ravengar was always a little mad.  If he was not so before, this affair had strained his intelligence too much.’

‘You did a very wrong thing,’ said Hugo, ‘in keeping silence.’

‘Put yourself in my place,’ Camilla answered.  ’Think of all the facts.  It was all so queer, And—­and—­Mr. Ravengar had found me in the room with young Powitt.  Suppose he had—­’

‘Say no more,’ Hugo besought her.  ‘How long is this ago?’

’Three years last June.  In six months young Powitt’s sentence will be up.’

Hugo nearly leapt from his chair.

‘Is it possible, Mrs. Tudor,’ he asked her eagerly, ’that you are not aware that in actual practice a reasonably well-behaved prisoner never serves the full period of his sentence?  Marks for good conduct are allowed, and each mark means so many days deducted from the term.’