"Mr. Breakspear, you ask too much."
"You desire to shield a murderer?"
"That is nothing new—with me. I have been doing that for many years."
No look could be more mournful than that accompanying her words.
"You will not give me the name that was trembling upon the lips of Miss Ravengar?"
"I did not hear it," replied Lorelie, evasively.
"But you have formed a suspicion?"
"My suspicions might compromise the innocent, even as I myself have been compromised," she added, with a reproachful glance at Beatrice.
"Forgive me," murmured Beatrice, with drooping eyes.
"Are we not all liable to error?" said Lorelie, kissing her tenderly. "I commend your frankness in coming to state your suspicions, painful though it was for me to listen. No; though fallen from what I might be, I have not yet stooped to murder." And then, turning to Idris, she said:—