“Why did she hold, nor ever reveal it? How could she guess it was there? And why, being there, did it not escape when the head fell?”
“Sir, sir, think! She is mad. She would penetrate and maintain such a secret with every artifice. As to the stone’s breaking away, the skin was all contracted and toughened about it like leather.”
“Dennis—this is an insane idea! And yet—why, great God! the skull’s gone!”
He stared blankly at his man.
“Oh!” he murmured in a moment, “if by any chance there is truth in this—if the wild story is no bogle of the girl’s distemper—how my own peevishness and cruelty react upon myself!”
He took the other by the shoulder.
“Dennis,” he said, “you have your revenge at last.”
“No, no, no!”
“Then, where is the skull? What have you done with it?”
The man hesitated.