“What do you mean?” exclaimed Britton, as Sir Frederick Hamilton halted on the parapet. “Speak, Maud, or by hell I’ll throw you in the river!”
“What do I mean, Andrew Britton!” replied Maud; “I mean pain and death here and torture everlasting in a world to come for you. Ay, for you, Andrew Britton—you cannot kill Maud. The Almighty has written our names in the book of mortality—but yours comes first. Yes, yours comes first, Andrew Britton!”
“Idiot!” muttered Britton. “Tell me at once—did you bring that Hartleton to the Chequers?”
“Hartleton!—Hartleton?” repeated Maud. “Oh, he was one of the spirits I knew long ago, before I dropped from among the stars.”
“Answer my question!” cried Britton, fiercely, “did you bring Hartleton to the Chequers?”
“Answer my question, Britton,” said Maud, “if your sealed black heart will let you. Why does not my husband come to his bride?”
“What do you mean?”
“We waited for him, but he came not; then they whispered he was dead—yes, dead, and I asked Heaven who had killed him, when a voice whispered—Andrew Britton!”
“Peace,” cried Britton. “You are mad.”
“Yes, mad—mad,” said Maud; “but not so mad as Andrew Britton, for he has murdered—murdered the innocent. There’s blood on your hands!”