The House of the Whispering Pines

agony and no

le, Heaven can

heus U

al, remained fixed upon my face as though he were still anxious to see me exone

ad revealed all I dared to. As I came to this conclusion, hi

he now aske

t little meaning to you. You must have seen, then, that the room where Miss Cumbe

ced tha

st have drun

t contra

land fond of tha

I might better have been less emphatic, but the mystery of those glasses had affected me from the first. Neither she

oining closet. It had not been used. That third

had risen in my mind

ses,” I dul

f cordial. The latte

hrase had become stereotyped. N

f it were not for those-marks on her

made them?

the nature of the doubt in this man’s mind. If these words, or any words I could use, would serve to surprise his secret, then welcome the lie or suggestion of a lie.

drank from,” he answered, steadily. “Tomorrow I may be i

word man. Either his official habit had stood him in wonderful stead, or the police had failed so far to see any

elf, in vain repetition. Would the morrow reveal the fact that Adelaide’s young sister had been with her in the hour of death, or would the fates propitiously aid her in preserving this

from which I was rudely wakened by a loud rattle at my door, followed by th

d he. “Breakfast will be

ed: “I’m sorry to say that we have here the warr

want of a warrant? It is as a witne

r. You will have to appear before a magistrate. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you

on starting from every pore as the full meaning of the charge burst u

gave m

he whispered in my ear, “It’s no go; one of our men saw you with your fingers on her throat. He had clambered in

le, hoping that I would explain this act and give him some opportunity to indulge in a doubt. And I had failed to respond to the hint he had given me. The act itself must appear so s

rangled by another’s clutch. One person only in the whole world would know and feel how false this accusation was. And yesterday that one’s trust in my guiltlessness would have thrown a ray of lig

of these rages. I had even seen her in one. When they passed she was her lovable self once more and very penitent and very downcast. If all I feared were true, she was suffering acutely now. But I gave no thought to this

I put the question which had b

uble here? What brought you to this house? T

u don’t know

ot,” I

wait till the chief ha

id, what would she do? I did not know her well enough to tell. The attraction she had felt for me had not been strong enough to lead her to accommodate herself to my wishes and marry me off-hand, but it had been strong enough to nerve her arm in whatever altercation she may have had with her jealous-minded sister. It was the temper and not the strength of the love which would tell in a strait like this. Would it prove of a generous kind? Should I have to combat her desire to take upon herself the full blame of her deed, with all its shames and penalties? Or should I have the still deeper misery of finding her callous to my position and welcoming any chance which d

ew near me again on our way to the head of

this tragedy been communicated to Miss Cumberland’s fa

mething in my aspect or the straight-forward look I ga

the younger, is very ill, and the boy — I don’t know his name — has not shown up since last evening

the stairs we were descending. I had hardly heard the

nd ill?” I stammered,

master of myself

Cumberland’s rooms, and rushing in found Miss Carmel, as she called her, lying on the floor near the open fire. Her face had struck the bars of the grate in falling, and she was badly burned. But that was not all; she was

s were standing about the front door, and in another moment I was bustled into

ut not in my dreams; it ever came back at night, sinister, awesome