"There was surprise and pain in the little woman's voice, and she pretended to throw other flowers from her withered hands on the mound her disordered fancy had created.
"'They disappear before they touch it!' she said. 'I almost expect it to speak, and protest against any attention from me. And it is sinking; trying to get away from me! How much his grave is like him; it shrinks away from me. I'll gather them up; I'll not leave them here!'
"Out of the air she seemed to be collecting wreaths, and crosses and flowers of every kind, and putting them back into her arms.
"'I will put them on the neglected mound in the lower hall, for no one else will do it. How odd the fair flowers will look on a background of weeds; but there shall be roses and violets on my grave, though I am compelled to put them there. Open the door, Tom; my strength is failing. I must hurry.'
"The door was opened, and she passed out of it, and down the dark hall, staggering as she went. When she reached the door through which she came at The Wolf's call, at the lower end of the passage, she turned around, held the candle above her head again, and said,—
"'Be merciful, Tom; I request that of you as a favor. You were never wronged by him, except through me, and I have never been resentful except to please you. Let the gentleman return and deliver the letter I gave him.'
"Opening the door near which she stood, she disappeared.
"So Tom was the cause of all the trouble? I resolved as we stepped back into the room that he should regret it, and I think there is no doubt that he does."
Tug turned on his back again, and seemed to be considering what course he had better pursue with reference to the remainder of his story. At last he got up from the bed slowly and painfully, and walked over to the cupboard where his law-book was kept, which he took down and opened on the table. After turning over its pages for a while, pausing occasionally to read the decisions presented, he shut up the book, returned it to the shelf, and went back to the bed.
"I am too much of a lawyer," he said, "to criminate myself, pardner, and you'll have to excuse me from going into further details. But I can give you a few conjectures. In my opinion the pale, ugly little woman without a mind, but who looked respectable enough, was once Allan Dorris's wife, but I don't know it; I heard nothing to confirm this suspicion except what I have told you. The Wolf was her brother (a man with an uglier disposition I never laid eyes on), and I shall always believe that Dorris married her when a very young man; that he finally gave her most of his property and struck out, resolved to hide from a woman who had always been a burden and a humiliation to him. It is possible that he was divorced from her a great many years before he came here, and that she lost her mind in consequence; it is possible that he had nothing to do with her; but I give you my guess, with the understanding that it is to go no farther. I am not in the habit of telling the truth; but this is the truth: I know no more about his past history than you do; but while in the city I came to the conclusion I have just given you."