“No, not Georgian, Anitra.  Henceforth Anitra, always Anitra.  Can you endure the ordeal for the sake of the safety and peace of mind it will bring?”

“I endure it!  Can you?  Remember the deafness that marks Anitra.”

“That can be cured.”  Her smile turned almost arch.  “We will travel; there are great physicians abroad.”

“A sister—­not a wife?”

“Your wife in time—­Ah, it will mean a new courtship and—­Anitra is a different woman from Georgian—­she has suffered—­you will love her better.”

“O God!  Harper, are we living, awake, sane?  Help me at this crisis.  I do not know where I am or what this is she really asks.”

“She asks the impossible.  She asks what you can, perhaps, give, but not what I can.  You forget that this deception calls for connivance on my part, and whatever you may think of me or my profession, deception is foreign to my nature and very repugnant to me.”

“And you refuse?”

“Mrs. Ransom, I must.”

The hope which had held her up, the life which had returned to body and spirit since this prospect of a possible future had dawned upon her, faded from glance and smile.

“Then good-by, Roger, we shall never have those happy days together of which we have often dreamt.  I may stay with you a week, a month, a year, but the horror of a great fear will be over us, and never, never can we know joy.”

She threw herself into her husband’s arms; she clung to him.

“One moment,” she cried, “one moment of perfect happiness before the shadow falls.  Oh, how I must love you, Roger, to say such words, to think such thoughts, with the body of the brother I loved so deeply once, lying there dead before us, killed by his own hand.”

Ransom softly drew her aside where her eyes could not fall upon the bed.

Harper stopped still where he was, the picture of gloom and uncertainty.

“It must be settled now,” said Ransom.  “As we leave this room, our relations must remain.”

“I cannot but think your fears all folly,” muttered Harper.  “Yet the responsibility you force upon me is terrible.  If it were not for that will!  How can I present it to the Surrogate when I know the testator is still alive?”

“You need not.  I will do that,” said Ransom.

“And the property!  Given to a man we none of us know.  Property that is not legally his.”

“I will make it so,” cried Georgian with a burst of new and uncontrollable hope as she saw, as she thought, this conscientious lawyer yielding.  “There is paper here; draw up a deed of gift.  I will sign it and you shall hold it so that whether I live or die, Auchincloss’ title to his money shall be absolute.  Thus much I wish to do, that Alfred’s life should not have been sacrificed for nothing.”

“Let me think.”

Harper was wavering.

* * * * *