"Why not something more than partners, after a while, Jack?"

She smiled strangely up to him.

"Because of this, Dick."

And fumbling at her throat, she showed him the glittering metal of the cross; an instinct made him swerve the horse away from her.

"The cross goes on, but what of you Jack?"

A long silence fell between them. Words died in the making.

The great weight pressing down on that slender throat was like the iron hand of a giant, but slowly one by one the sounds marshalled themselves:

". . . God knows …" It was the passing of Judgment. "God knows … not I."