“What was it, then?”
“Just this: I once—in a fight—killed a man!”
She recoiled a little. It was an involuntary movement, but Gordon saw it, and it caused him to continue quickly:
“I never meant to do it, Heaven knows. But we’d quarreled, and it came to a fight. I remember that. But I swear I do not recall striking a blow hard enough to kill him. It was on the point of the jaw, and he fell senseless. But he should have recovered in a few seconds. It was not a deadly blow, ordinarily. We had both been drinking. That—that is why I never touch liquor now, Bessie.”
“Perhaps you didn’t kill him,” she whispered. “Perhaps he was not really dead.”
“Yes, he was. A doctor was in the room—a friend of mine. He examined him, and pronounced him quite dead. Then I ran away.”
“And that is all you know about it?”
“I heard afterward that the coroner’s jury found a verdict of ‘Accidental death.’”
“Then you have nothing to fear.”
“My own conscience. And, if I were to go back home, there are persons who know that I killed Richard Jarvis. My father is a wealthy, influential man, and he may have hushed it up. But I know. So does he.”