That look I could no longer withhold. I must know the depth of the gulf
over which I hung. I must not wrong with a thought one who had smiled
upon me like an angel of light--a young girl, too, with the dew of
innocence on her beauty to every eye but mine and only not to mine
within--shall I say ten awful minutes? It seemed ages,--all of my life
and more. Yet that lovely breast had heaved not so many times since I
looked upon her as a deified mortal, and now two small spots on another
woman's pulseless throat had drawn a veil of blood over that beauty, and
given to a child the attributes of a Medusa. Yet hope was not quite
stilled. I would look again and perhaps discover that my own eyes had
been at fault, that there were no marks, or if marks, not just the ones
my fancy had painted there.

Turning, I let my glance fall first on the feet. I had not noted them
before, and I was startled to see that the arctics in which they were
clad were filled all around with snow. She had walked then, as the other
was walking now; she, who detested every effort and was of such delicate
make that exertion of unusual kind could not readily be associated with
her. Had she come alone or in Carmel's company, and if in Carmel's
company, on what ostensible errand if not that of death? Her dress,
which was of dark wool, showed that she had changed her garments for this
trip. I had seen her at dinner, and this was not the gown she had worn
then--the gown in which she had confronted me during those few
intolerable minutes when I could not meet her eyes. Fatal cowardice! A
moment of realisation then and we might all have been saved this horror
of sin and death and shameful retribution.

And yet who knows? Not understanding what I saw, how could I measure the
might-have-beens! I would proceed with my task--note if she wore the