Struck in spite of herself, moved perhaps by a hope she had not allowed herself to contemplate before, she looked at him long and earnestly.
"And do you really wish to help me?" she inquired. "Are you so generous as to forgive the pain, and possibly the humiliation, I have inflicted upon you, and lend me your assistance in case my testimony works its due effect, and he be brought to trial instead of Mr. Hildreth?"
It was a searching and a pregnant question, for which Mr. Orcutt was possibly not fully prepared, but his newly gained control did not give way.
"I must insist upon hearing the facts before I say any thing of my intentions," he averred. "Whatever they may be, they cannot be more startling in their character than those which have been urged against Hildreth."
"But they are," she whispered. Then with a quick look around her, she put her mouth close to Mr. Orcutt's ear and breathed:
"Mr. Hildreth is not the only man who, unseen by the neighbors, visited Mrs. Clemmens' house on the morning of the murder. Craik Mansell was there also."
"Craik Mansell! How do you know that? Ah," he pursued, with the scornful intonation of a jealous man, "I forgot that you are lovers."
The sneer, natural as it was, perhaps, seemed to go to her heart and wake its fiercest indignation.
"Hush," cried she, towering upon him with an ominous flash of her proud eye. "Do not turn the knife in that wound or you will seal my lips forever." And she moved hastily away from his side. But in another instant she determinedly returned, saying: "This is no time for indulging in one's sensibilities. I affirm that Craik Mansell visited his aunt on that day, because the ring which was picked up on the floor of her dining-room—you remember the ring, Mr. Orcutt?"
Remember it! Did he not? All his many perplexities in its regard crowded upon him as he made a hurried bow of acquiescence.