Page:The Other House (London, William Heinemann, 1896), Volume 2.djvu/198

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184
THE OTHER HOUSE

Tony thought a moment. "Her doom will be to live."

"But how will such a fiend be suffered to live—when she went to it before my eyes?" Jean stared at the mountain of evidence; then eagerly: "And Mr. Vidal—her very lover, who'll swear what he knows—what he saw!"

Tony stubbornly shook his head. "Oh, Mr. Vidal!"

"To make me," Jean cried, "seem the monster———!"

Tony looked at her so strangely that she stopped. "She made it for the moment possible———"

She caught him up. "To suspect me———?"

"I was mad—and you're weren't there." With a muffled moan she sank down again; she covered her face with her hands. "I tell you all—I tell you all," he said. "He knows nothing—he saw nothing—he'll swear nothing. He's taking her away."

Jean started as if he had struck her. "She's here?"

Tony wondered. "You didn't know it?"

"She came back?" the girl panted.

"You thought she had fled?"