"Gratitude! Mayhap you will tell me what it is I have to be grateful for. All I craved was the chance to die as a soldier should, and some one must needs spoil me of that!"
"Selfish—selfish always and to the last," she murmured. "Do you never give a moment's thought to the feelings of others, Captain Ireton?"
This was past all endurance.
"If I had not, should I be here this moment?" I raved. "You do make me sicker than I was, my lady."
"Yet I say you are selfish," she insisted. "What have I done that you should come here to have yourself hanged for a spy?"
"Let us have plain speech, in God's name," I retorted. "You know well enough there was no better way in which I could serve you."
"Do I, indeed, mon ami?" she flashed out. "Let me tell you, sir, had she ever a blush of saving pride, Margery Stair—or Margery Ireton, if you like that better—would kill you with her own hand rather than have it said her husband died upon a gallows!"
A sudden light broke in upon me and I went blind in the horror of it.
"God in Heaven!" I gasped; "'twas you, then? I do believe you poisoned me in that dish of tea you sent me last night!"
She laughed, a bitter little laugh that I hated to think on afterward.