“I must do justice,” he said, firmly.
“What do you call justice?” she cried, wringing her hands.
“I shall deliver the man who did the deed to the laws of his country, and they shall punish him for the murder done.”
Her face grew ghastly pale as she listened. It was terrible to gaze upon, awful to see. Great drops of agony gathered on the white brow. He turned his face away lest he should see the torture he was bound to inflict.
She knelt at his feet, and raised her hands as though she were supplicating the mightiest power.
“Kenelm, have pity on me if you will not on him! Have mercy on me; if you injure him you kill me. You can only reach him through my heart. See, dear,” she continued, with a low sob, “if you stood here, and you took deadly aim at him I would fling myself before him and die first. You should walk over me dead before you touched him! All my life is bound up in his. I live in him. My soul is one with his. Oh, Kenelm! for God’s dear sake, have pity and spare!”
But he never even turned his face toward her.
“I love him so dearly,” she moaned—“oh, so dearly, Kenelm! Have pity on me. I have never wronged you. I have been a true, good friend to you all my life. I have sorrowed for your sorrows. Spare me now!”
“I would not injure you, Hermione,” he said, in a low, hoarse voice. “I——”
But she interrupted him.