She pressed her hand, that had just touched the dead man's, on
her forehead, and gave a moment to thought.
What her decision might have been, we cannot say, for while she stood in
this attitude, Middleton stept from his seclusion, and at the noise of
his approach she turned suddenly round, looking more frightened and
agitated than at the moment when she had first seen the dead body. She
faced Middleton, however, and looked him quietly in the eye. "You see
this!" said she, gazing fixedly at him. "It is not at this moment that
you first discover it."
"No," said Middleton, frankly. "It is not. I was present at the
catastrophe. In one sense, indeed, I was the cause of it; but, Alice, I
need not tell you that I am no murderer."
"A murderer?--no," said Alice, still looking at him with the same fixed
gaze. "But you and this man were at deadly variance. He would have
rejoiced at any chance that would have laid you cold and bloody on the
earth, as he is now; nay, he would most eagerly have seized on any
fair-looking pretext that would have given him a chance to stretch you
there. The world will scarcely believe, when it knows all about your
relations with him, that his blood is not on your hand. Indeed," said
she, with a strange smile, "I see some of it there now!"
And, in very truth, so there was; a broad blood-stain that had dried on
Middleton's hand.
Pages:
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43