The blood ran cold in her veins.  This thing that had happened was as startling as a miracle.  But no!  No higher Power had anything to do with this blow.  Orion believed that she had failed in her promise of screening him by her silence, and this, this was his revenge.  By what means—­how he had gone to work, was a mystery.  What a trick!—­and it had succeeded!  But should she take it like a patient child?  No.  A thousand times no!  Suddenly all her old powers of resistance came back; hatred steeled her wavering will; and, as in fancy, he had seen himself in the circus, driving in a race, so she pictured herself seated at the chess-board.  She felt herself playing with all her might to win; but not, as with his father, for flowers, trifling presents or mere glory; nay, for a very different stake Life or Death!

She would do everything, anything to conquer him; and yet, no—­come what might—­not everything.  Sooner would she succumb than betray him as the thief or reveal what she had discovered in the viridarium.  She had promised to keep the secret; and she would repay the father’s kindness by screening the son from this disgrace.  How beautiful, how noble had Orion’s image been in her heart.  She would not stain it with this disgrace in her own eyes and in those of the world.  But every other reservation must be cast far, far away, to snatch the victory from him and to save Hiram.  Every fair weapon she might use; only this treachery she could not, might not have recourse to.  He must be made to feel that she was more magnanimous than he; that she, under all conceivable circumstances, kept her word.  That was settled; her bosom once more rose and fell, and her eye brightened again; still it was some little time before she could find the right words with which to begin the contest.

Orion could see the seething turmoil in her soul; he felt that she was arming herself for resistance, and he longed to spur her on to deal the first blow.  Not a word had she uttered of surprise or anger, not a syllable of reproach had passed her lips.  What was she thinking of, what was she plotting?  The more startling and dangerous the better; the more bravely she bore herself, the more completely in the background might he leave the painful sense of fighting against a woman.  Even heroes had boasted of a victory over Amazons.

At last, at last!—­She rose and went towards Hiram.  He had been tied to the stake to which criminals were bound, and as an imploring glance from his honest eyes met hers, the spell that fettered her tongue was unloosed; she suddenly understood that she had not merely to protect herself, but to fulfil a solemn duty.  With a few rapid steps she went up to the table at which her judges sat in a semi-circle, and leaning on it with her left hand, raised her right high in the air, exclaiming: 

“You are the victims of a cruel fraud; and I of an unparalleled and wicked trick, intended to bring me to ruin!—­Look at that man at the stake.  Does he look like a robber?  A more honest and faithful servant never earned his freedom, and the gratitude Hiram owed to his master, my father, he has discharged to the daughter for whose sake he quitted his home, his wife and child.  He followed me, an orphan, here into a strange land.—­But that matters not to you.—­Still, if you will hear the truth, the strict and whole. . . .”