"Then I say he did kill him."
She spoke with slow distinctness. William could only look at her in amazement. Was her mind wandering? She sat glaring at him with her light blue eyes, so glazed, yet glistening; just the same eyes that used to puzzle old Anthony Dare.
"What did you say?" asked William.
"I say that Herbert Dare is a second Cain," she answered.
"He did not kill Anthony," repeated William. "He could not have killed him. He was in another place at the time."
"Yes. With that Puritan child in the dainty dress—fit attire only for your folles in—what you call the place?—Bedlam! I know he was in another place," she continued: and she appeared to be growing terribly excited, between passion and natural emotion.
"Then what are you speaking of?" asked William. "It is an impossibility that Herbert could have killed his brother."
"He caused him to be killed."
William felt a nameless dread creeping over him. "What do you mean?" he breathed.
"I send that letter, which you have taken charge of, to Herbert the bad; but he moves about from place to place, and it may never reach him. So I want to tell you in substance what is written in the letter, that you may repeat it to him when you come across him. He may be going back to Helstonleigh some day; if he not die off first, with his vagabond life. Was it not said there, once, that he was dead?"