At that moment Gran’ther Groves, still in his long red flannel bedgown, his gray locks awry like one distraught, his aged face purple with rage, reëntered the room and hobbled across it till he stood in front of Eva, crying out to her in terrible wrath:
“I jest natchelly ought to kill you, gal, same as Terry killed your vile partner in shame!”
“Oh, gran’ther, I am innocent!” little Eva answered, in wild remonstrance.
But, heedless of her passionate protest, the half-crazed old man began to pour out the most scathing denunciation, drawing every one around to listen except the two whose ears were dulled in death.
In a lull of his passionate accusations she cried frantically:
“Oh, stop and let me speak, dear, dear gran’ther! Do not believe your little Eva the vile thing you say! No, no, if I were, I would bare my breast for your deathblow! I tell you, there was some fatal mistake. If Terry had but waited a moment, Doctor Ludington would have explained all to him!”
“Perhaps you can explain it!” the angry old man sneered incredulously.
“Yes, yes, if you will listen in kindness, and not glare at me in such fury, like a wild beast about to spring and devour me! Oh, gran’ther, how can you be so cruel to your poor little Eva, that loved you so!” she sobbed reproachfully.
“Go on with your explanation,” he answered, with brutal impatience in his unreasoning wrath, and she sobbed on:
“I never spoke to Doctor Ludington in all my life until to-night. Some one—some wicked practical joker that ought to be hung—sent him here, telling him I was ill, dying, and wished him to come. Seeing how angry I was, he explained to me, and was about to go when—when Terry entered in a senseless rage—because he loved me and was jealous. Then he would listen to nothing! He fell upon an unarmed man, the coward, and killed him! That is the true story, gran’ther, and I swear to you I am innocent!”