There followed a lengthy silence upon his story; then Mr. Collins made an end.
"'Tis the awful hardness of sharin' such a dreadful secret wi' wan other man as I caan't endure no more. An' I swear, by any deep word you choose, that I never meant no findin' of anybody's secrets—awnly gude to missus—as might have been saved by what we went for, but won't never be better without it."
"That's as may be, Henry," said Mr. Endicott. "For the rest, this thing is somebody's secret, as you say. Anyway you're not weighed down with it now. You may hold yourself free of it, and if you take my advice, having eased your mind, you'll go off to rest with a quiet conscience. No great harm can fall on you at any rate. Perhaps none at all, for I'll wager it was Cramphorn, not you, who hatched this piece of folly."
"Please, please, doan't name nobody, your honours!" implored Henry. "I promised the man to bide still as a worm 'bout it. In fact I swore I would. An' I did try to keep him off my tongue at any rate, an' thought as I had."
"We shall not take any steps against him or you. Now go to bed and sleep. You've done the right thing in telling us; but don't tell anybody else."
Mr. Collins, not sorry to depart, did so, and for some minutes Stapledon and the blind man continued to sit in silence, each busy with his own thoughts. Then Mark spoke.
"A stunning, dislocating, play-acting piece of foolery, if it's true. Yet somehow I know it is. There's a deal of light shed on darkness for me, and for you too I reckon, by such an upheaval."
"Not so. I see no light—unless you believe this means that Christopher Yeoland may still be alive."
"Yes, I think it means that; and such a return must be an earthquake more or less in all the lives that were once connected with him. Men can't die and live again without upsetting the world. A mad imagining. Perhaps no mother's son but him would have dreamed of it. But the motive——"
"That," said Myles quickly, "is all I can see. Knowing as much of the man as I do, so much looks clear. When Clack joined him, I sent a message. It was as urgent as need be, and to the effect that Honor loved him still. That she loved me too Clack probably added to my message. While one of us lived, Honor would never have married the other. So this thing he did to make her road easy."