“Then why make insinuations that cannot be explained?” cried his sister, standing up very straight and looking the Superintendent fair in the face.
“Explained?” echoed the Superintendent in a cool, almost contemptuous, voice. “There are certain things best not explained, but believe me if Mr. Raven desires explanation he can have it.”
The men were all on their feet. Quickly Moira turned to Raven with a gesture of appeal and a look of loyal confidence in her eyes. For a moment the hard, cynical face was illumined with a smile of rare beauty, but only for a moment. The gleam passed and the old, hard, cynical face turned in challenge to the Superintendent.
“Explain!” he said bitterly, defiantly. “Go on if you can.”
The Superintendent stood silent.
“Ah!” breathed Moira, a thrill of triumphant relief in her voice, “he cannot explain.”
With dramatic swiftness the explanation came. It was from Jerry.
“H'explain?” cried the little half-breed, quivering with rage. “H'explain? What for he can no h'explain? Dem horse he steal de night-tam'—dat whiskee he trade on de Indian. Bah! He no good—he one beeg tief. Me—I put him one sure place he no steal no more!”
A few moments of tense silence held the group rigid. In the center stood Raven, his face pale, hard, but smiling, before him Moira, waiting, eager, with lips parted and eyes aglow with successive passions, indignation, doubt, fear, horror, grief. Again that swift and subtle change touched Raven's face as his eyes rested upon the face of the girl before him.
“Now you know why I cannot stay,” he said gently, almost sadly.