I recalled what Hagar had said about her father having told her that he had a very private and important interview that night, and must not be disturbed. Von Felsen had arranged that easily enough no doubt from his knowledge of his victim's affairs. He would have little difficulty, moreover, in getting into the Jew's house and to the Jew's room secretly; and the rest was easy to guess.
There had probably been a struggle of some sort in which the ring had been pulled off von Felsen's finger; but he had found his chance to deliver the death-thrust in the back, and in his unnerved confusion afterwards he had not missed the ring.
I believed him to be as great a coward as he was a scoundrel, and at such a moment of crisis his thoughts would be too intent upon escaping from the scene of his crime to think of anything else.
And now what ought I to do?
As I began to consider this, the thought flashed upon me that indirectly I had been the cause of the Jew's death. It was my action in forcing on the marriage which had led von Felsen to this desperate means of preventing it. I had thrust him into a comer from which he could see no other means of escape.
How often I had regretted that act of mine! Even Althea herself had deemed it a mistake.
Regrets were useless now, however. I had to decide what line to take in view of the fateful proof which had come into my possession. I had his life in my hands. Was I to use the power to further my own purposes or to help justice?
I had to a certain extent compromised myself by not disclosing the possession of the ring to the police before I left the Jew's house, and the fears which had operated to prevent my doing so had no doubt been well grounded. But this did not prevent me from seeing plainly that my duty was to return and state all I knew and give up the evidence I had.
It was a difficult problem. On the one side there was Althea's happiness and all I cared for in life; on the other, the satisfaction of the demands of abstract justice and the punishment of a murderer.
I do not know how another man placed as I was would have acted, but I could not bring myself to make the necessary sacrifice. Let those blame me who will, but let them first try to put themselves in my position.