"But ye loved her?" and she looked at me quickly.
"No," I answered, "I had no right to love her. If I had loved her I should have tried to save her. She's dead now, but I do not think I can ever forget her."
"Oh," she said, "then you canna forget her. You're never likely to love anither lassie? But ye speak in riddles. Wha was she? Tell me."
It was a hard thing to do, but there was nothing for it. So I told her the story of Margaret Wilson. She listened breathlessly with mounting colour. Her eyes dilated and her lips parted as she sat with awe and pity gathering in her face.
When I had finished she turned from me in silence and looked into the distance. Then she sprang to her feet and faced me, with glowing eyes.
"And you were there! You!" she cried. "You helped the murderers! O God! I wish I had left you on the moor to die!"
This was my condemnation: this my punishment; that this sweet girl should turn from me in horror, hating me. I bent my head in shame.
She stood above me, and when I dared to lift my eyes I saw that her hands, which she had clasped, were trembling.
"Mary," I murmured, and at my voice she started as though my lips polluted her name, "Mary--you cannot know the agony I have suffered for what I did, nor how remorse has bitten into my heart torturing me night and day. It was for that I became a deserter."
"You deserted, and put yoursel' in danger o' death because you were sorry," she said slowly, as though weighing each word.