"Zara declares that you did. She saw you through the window."
"She saw me--yes--she told me she saw me--but I was marking the forehead of Uncle Henry with that"--he pointed to the stamp. "He was dead when I entered the room; I swear that he was."
"Then you WERE in Uncle Henry's room on that night?" cried Clarice, springing to her feet with horror-filled eyes. "You DID stamp his poor flesh with that accursed Purple Fern. Oh, Anthony, Anthony," she rushed towards her lover and caught at him with both hands, "how can I bear it--how can I bear it? Disgrace--shame--murder--"
Ferdy slipped on to the floor, and clutched at her dress. He was terrified at seeing Clarice desert him in this way, and whimpered like a child that had been left alone in the dark. "Not murder. No! no! I swear not murder. But--but--but--" he broke down crying, and hid his shameful face in his hands, sobbing bitterly.
A silence ensued. Clarice concealed her face in Anthony's breast, and he held her tightly to him, feeling absolutely helpless under the strain of the moment, and feeling also that he was unable to console her in any way. The door creaked and swung inward gently under a scratching paw, and old Jane hobbled into the room, on the look-out for afternoon tea. Seeing Ferdy on the ground, she went up to him and licked the hands which concealed his face. In a mechanical manner he smoothed her head, and in the stillness the clock on the mantelpiece could be heard ticking steadily in the pauses of the beating rain. Anthony was the first to recover his composure. "We must come to some arrangement before Jerce arrives," he said.
"Jerce!" Ferdy leaped to his feet so unexpectedly that Jane ran under the sofa with a howl of dismay. "Jerce?"
"He is coming down--he will be here in a few minutes. Clarice, dear"--he led her to an armchair--"sit down and compose yourself."
"I am all right now," said Clarice, in a suffocating voice, and calmed her unruly nerves with a violent effort. "Now then, Ferdy," she said, in an ominously quiet voice, "we are waiting for your story."
"How much do you know of it?" asked the miserable young man.
"As much as Zara could tell me," said his sister, in a sad voice, "as much as Osip knew."