He saw her fingers clutch each other, and the artery in her throat throb quickly.

“How many victims are required to appease the manes of Gen’l Darrington?  Be satisfied with having sacrificed me, and waste no more time in search that can bring neither recompense to you, nor consolation to me.  If I can bear my fate, you, sir, have no right to interfere.”

“Then, like the selfish man I am, I usurp the right.  What damnable infatuation can bind you to that miserable poltroon, who skulks in safety, knowing that the penalty of his evil deeds falls on you?  One explanation has suggested itself:  it haunts me like a fiend, and only you can exorcise it.  Are you married to that brute, and is it loyalty that nerves you?  For God’s sake do not trifle, tell me the truth.”

He leaned across the table, caught her hands.  She shook off his touch, and her eyes were ablaze.

“Are you insane?  How dare you cherish such a suspicion?  The bare conjecture is an insult, and you must know it is false.  Married?  I?”

“Forgive me if I wound you, but indeed I could conceive of no other solution of the mystery of your self-sacrifice; for it is utterly incredible that unless some indissoluble tie bound you, that cowardly knave could command your allegiance.  It maddens me to think that you, so far beyond all other women, can tolerate the thought of that—­”

“Hush! hush!  You conjure phantoms with which to taunt and torture.  You pity me so keenly, that your judgment becomes distorted, and you chase chimeras.  Banish imaginary husbands, Western journeys, even the thought of my wretched doom, and try henceforth to forget that I ever saw X—.”

“What does this mean?  It was not on your hand when I held it so long that day—­in my own.  Tell me, and quiet my pain.”

He pointed to the heavy ring, which was much too large for the wasted finger where it glistened.

“What does it mean?  A tale of woe.  It means that when my broken-hearted mother was dying among strangers, in a hospital, she kissed her wedding ring, and sent it with her love and blessing to the child—­she idolized.  It means—­” She held up her waxen hand, and into her voice stole immeasurable tenderness:  “Shall I tell you all it means?  This little gold hoop inscribed inside ‘I.  B. to E. D.,’ girdles all that this world has left for me; memories of father, mother, sunny childhood in a peaceful home, lofty ambitions, happy, happy beautiful hopes that once belonged to the girl Beryl, whom pitiless calamity has broken on her cruel wheel.  Walled up, dying slowly in a convict’s tomb, the only light that shines into my desolate heart, flickers through this little circle; and clasping it close through the long, long nights, when horrible images brood like vampires, it soothes me, like the touch of the dear hand which it graced so long, and brings me dreams of the fair, sweet past.”

Was it the mist in his eyes that showed her almost glorified by the level rays of the setting sun, as like a tired child she leaned her head against the wall, a pale image of resignation?