‘You went into the room?’

‘Yes.  No one was there.’

Both kept silence.  Sibyl had become very grave, and was thinking intently.  Then, with a few brief questions, vigilant, precise, she learnt all that had taken place between Hugh and Mrs. Maskell, between Hugh and the doctor; heard of the woman’s disappearance, and of Mrs Fenimore’s arrival on the scene.

‘What shall you do now?’

‘Go back and give myself up.  What else can I do?’

‘And tell everything —­ as you have told it to me?’

Hugh met her eyes and moved his arms in a gesture of misery.

’No!  I will think of something.  He is dead, and can’t contradict; and the woman will hide —­ trust her.  Your name shan’t come into it at all.  I owe you that, Sibyl.  I’ll find some cause for a quarrel with him.  Your name shan’t be spoken.’

She listened, her eyes down, her forehead lined in thought.

‘I know what!’ Hugh exclaimed, with gloomy resolve.  ’That woman —­ of course, there’ll be a mystery, and she’ll be searched for.  Why’ —­ he blustered against his shame —­ ’why shouldn’t she be the cause of it?  Yes, that would do.’

His hoarse laugh caused a tremor in Sibyl; she rose and stepped close to him, and laid a hand upon his shoulder.

’So far you have advised yourself.  Will you let me advise you now, dear?’

‘Wouldn’t that seem likely?’

’I think not.  And if it did —­ what is the result?  You will be dealt with much more severely.  Don’t you see that?’

’What’s that to me?  What do I care so long as you are out of the vile business?  You will have no difficulties.  Your mother’s money; and then Mackintosh ——­’

‘And is that all?’ asked Sibyl, with a look which seemed to wonder profoundly.  ‘Am I to think only of my own safety?’

’It’s all my cursed fault —­ just because I’m a fierce, strong brute, who ought to be anywhere but among civilised people.  I’ve killed the man who meant me nothing but kindness.  Am I going to drag your name into the mud —­ to set people grinning and winking ——­’

’Be quiet, Hugh, and listen.  I have a much clearer head than yours, poor boy.  There’s only one way of facing this scandal, and that is to tell everything.  For one thing, I shall not let you shield that woman —­ we shall catch her yet.  I shall not let you disgrace yourself by inventing squalid stories.  Don’t you see, too, that the disgrace would be shared by —­ by the dead man?  Would that be right?  And another thing —­ if shame comes upon you, do you think I have no part in it?  We have to face it out with the truth.’

‘You don’t know what that means,’ he answered, with a groan.  ’You don’t know the world.’

Sibyl did not smile, but her lips seemed only to check themselves when the smile was half born.