Haltingly, rather breathlessly, the story came from her lips. It sounded monstrous as she uttered it. She could not look at Fletcher, but she knew that he was angry; something in the intense stillness of his attitude told her this.
"Please go on," he said, as she paused. "You undertook to tell me the whole truth, remember."
With difficulty she continued.
"He told me that the mare was frightened by a trick, that you chose the hill-road because it was lonely and difficult. He told me exactly what you would say when you came back. And—and you said it."
"And that decided you to play a trick upon me and escape?" questioned Fletcher. "Your friend's suggestion, I presume?"
His words fell with cold precision; they sounded as if they came through his teeth.
She assented almost inaudibly. He made her feel contemptible.
"And afterwards?" he asked relentlessly.
She made a final effort; there was that in his manner that frightened her.
"Afterwards, he gave a signal—it was the cry of a jay—for me to follow. And he led me over the hill to a stream where he waited for me. We crossed it together, and very soon after he pointed out the valley-road below us, and left me."