"Cherchez la femme!" murmured the lady.
"Yes. She would not come forward."
Mrs. Spottiswoode looked at Malcolm. "Have you seen him?" she asked.
"No, I've been in New Orleans for three months. But I hope to begin my visits at the Penitentiary very soon, and I'm looking forward to meeting him."
"You'll agree with me, I'll bet a hat!" said Mason. "By the way"—he held up his hand—"he gave me this ring, the day he was sentenced."
Echo felt every nerve suddenly tighten. For it had come to her in a flash where she had seen that ring's counterpart: it had been on the finger of the masked burglar on that horrible midnight in Craig's library—when he had held out to her the letters from the safe! Her heart began to beat suffocatingly. "Take them and go—go instantly!"—she seemed to hear the tense command strike across the car. A thrill ran over her. Was the ring a kind of badge, a sign of their guilty calling? Or could it be that the man who was being tried was not the man who had shot Craig—but the other, the one who had saved her?
She began to tremble, for another thought stabbed her. If this was so, how could she honourably keep silence? The instant question touched her conscience, her quick sense of justice and duty, with sudden insistence. But for the spoilers themselves, she was the only witness of that deed in the library. Craig—so narrow had been for him that instant of observation—might have been mistaken. But not she! The very fright and horror of the moment had indelibly fixed the shooter's face upon her mind. Suppose Mason's hypothesis were correct—suppose he had been no burglar, but an honourable man, caught, as she had been, in a web of circumstance. In the crisis he had acted as a gentleman, had thought of her before himself. Instead of flying with the others, he had lingered to do that generous deed for her. What if it were because of that he had been taken! If so, what a debt she owed him!
It came to her suddenly that she must be certain. Never again could she know peace of soul till she knew the truth. If the man in the Penitentiary was indeed the man who had shot Craig, well and good. If not...
She turned her head, for Malcolm was speaking to her. "When you come to Nancy's you must let me take you both out to see these protégés of mine that have to be shut up for the good of their souls. Wouldn't you like to, eh?"
She thought he must hear the beating of her pulse. "Would—don't they resent being stared at?" she faltered.