For a moment I paused in hesitation.
“Answer me a single question, Ella,” I said. “Remember you are my wife, and should have no secrets from me. Tell me, truthfully and honestly, how there came into your possession the secret document that was stolen from me on the day of Dudley’s death.”
The colour left her face, her lips moved, and a slight shiver ran over her shoulders as she gazed at me. Never before had her eyes seemed so large, nor had there been such depths in them. Some subtle influence seemed in an instant to have transfigured her whole being.
Chapter Twenty Nine.
The Seal of Silence.
“No, you must not ask me, for I cannot tell you,” she faltered, after I had gravely repeated my earnest inquiry. She shrank from my embrace, and as she stood before me, her handsome head was bent in an attitude of utter dejection.
“Ah, the same lame story?” I cried impatiently. “You refuse.”
She raised her sad eyes. I saw in their clear depths a yearning for pity.