“But now it is a secret no longer. If he gets well it will only be to face a trial for the attempt upon Mr. Parker’s life.”
“Nothing will come of that,” Tregarvon predicted confidently. “Parker is dead; he died suddenly in his New York office a few days ago. And no twelve Tennesseeans could ever be found who would convict your brother for trying to avenge his father’s wrongs.”
“We are your poor debtors—all of us,” she went on. “You are heaping coals of fire on our heads, and—and they burn! Of course, you know now that I was my brother’s accomplice?”
“I know nothing of the sort; of course, you were not!”
“But I was—in a way. All along, I feared that it was he who was making, or at least planning, all the trouble you were having. He was so bitter!”
Tregarvon nodded complete comprehension. “I knew you were anxious about somebody; I thought, at first, that it was Hartridge, and later that it was your father. You have had a heavy burden to carry; and I have been doing what I could to make it heavier.”
“You have,” she said quite frankly.
He did not affect to misunderstand.
“You knew all the time that Poictiers and Elizabeth were held apart only by Elizabeth’s engagement to me?”
“I guessed it. But that didn’t excuse you for—for——”