“Frank’s mother. She had the impression of it when she was dying, and she warned Frank that it would be so.”
“Poor Selina! But—my dear lady, how do you know that?”
“My husband told me. He told me one night when we were sitting alone in the parlour. Not that he put faith in it. He had escaped Stephen’s toils until then, he said in a joking tone, and thought he could take care of himself and escape them still. But I fear he did not.”
“Now what is it you do fear?” asked the Squire. “Come.”
She glanced round in dread, and then spoke with considerable hesitation and in a low whisper.
“I fear—that Stephen—may have—murdered him.”
“Mercy upon us!” uttered the Squire, recoiling a step or two.
She put her elbow on the stile and raised her hand to her face, showing out so pale and distressed under its white net border.
“It lies upon me, sir—a great agony. I don’t know what to do.”
“But it could not be,” cried the Squire, collecting his scared senses. “Your imagination must run away with you, child. Frank died up at Dr. Dale’s; Stephen Radcliffe was down here at the time.”