“Molly,” he said, rising from the chair in which he had been sitting and going toward her, “I feel that I must tell you everything. God knows, this is the crisis of my life, and to whom should I turn in my sorrow, if not to the woman I love, and whom I know loves me? Have you read the account of the inquest in the papers?”
“No,” she answered, “I would not read it, lest I should derive a false impression from it. I am quite willing to hear what you have to say about it, and to accept your version as the truth.”
“God bless you, dear, for your trust in me!” he replied; “but it is necessary that you should hear what other people have to say upon the matter. Read it carefully, and, when you have finished, tell me what you think about it.”
He gave her the paper, and for a moment she stood as if undecided.
“Do you really wish it?” she asked.
“It is better that you should do so, believe me,” he said. “In that case, no one can say that I kept anything back from you.”
“I will read it,” she said, and went toward the window-seat to do so.
While she was reading, he stood before the fire and watched her. He noticed the poise of the beautiful head, the sweet hands holding the paper, on one finger of which sparkled the engagement ring he had given her, and the tiny foot just peeping from beneath the dark green skirt. She was a woman worth fighting all the world for, and, as he reflected how easy it would be for false evidence to separate them, he experienced a fear such as he had never known in his life before.
When she had finished, she crossed the room with the paper in her hand. Deliberately folding it up and laying it upon the table, she went to him, and placed her hands in his. Looking up into his face with trustful eyes, she said:
“I told you yesterday, Godfrey, that I believed in you. I tell you again, that, whatever the world may say with regard to this dreadful affair, it will make no difference in my love. I feel as convinced as I am of anything that, by whatever means, or at whose hand, that poor girl met her death, you were in no sort of way responsible for, or connected with it. You believe me, don’t you?”