Suddenly he stopped in his swift pace, faced the girl, and asked, “You are quite sure you can't love me?” He was waiting for an answer.
“No, I can't—I hate to cause you misery, but I must speak the truth; you have asked for it.”
“And you've answered honestly. I know it was foolish in me to ask the impossible. Just one more question and then I will tell you why I brought you here. Do you still believe in Mortimer's innocence—do you love Mortimer?”
“Yes.”
“If I were to tell you that he is innocent, that I have discovered the guilty one.”
“Oh, my God!” It was a cry of sudden joy, incapable of exact expression, irrelevant in its naming of the Deity, but full in its exultation of soul. Then, in quick transformation, the girl collapsed, as Cass had done, and huddled in her chair, stricken by the sudden conviction that the crime had been brought home to her brother. Her lover was guiltless; but to joy over it was a sin, inhuman, for was not Alan the thief, if Mortimer were innocent?
Crane understood. He had forgotten. He stepped quickly to the girl's side, put his hand tenderly on her head; her big gray eyes stared up at him full of a shrinking horror.
“Poor little woman!” he said, “your big, tender heart will be the death of you yet. But I've got only good news for you this time. Neither Mortimer nor Alan took the money—it was Cass.”
“They are both innocent?”
“Yes, both.”