He strode away into the parlour, and the other two had no alternative but to follow him.  They followed him like guilty things; for the manner of his confession was such as apparently to put his hearers, more than himself, in the wrong.  He confessed as one who accuses.

“Sit down,” said he, in the parlour.

“But surely,” Louis protested, “if you’re serious—­”

“If I’m serious, man!  Do you take me for a bally mountebank?  Do you suppose I’m doing this for fun?”

“Well,” said Louis, “if you are serious, you needn’t tell us any more.  We know, and that’s enough, isn’t it?”

Julian replied curtly, “You’ve got to hear me out.”

And picking up his document from the floor, he resumed the perusal.

“’Also, if the gas hadn’t been where it is, I should not have noticed anything on the top of the cupboard.  I took the notes because I was badly in need of money, and also because I was angry at money being left like that on the tops of cupboards.  I had no idea Aunt Maldon was such a foolish woman.’”

Louis interjected soothingly:  “But you only meant to teach the old lady a lesson and give the notes back.”

“I didn’t,” said Julian, again extremely irritated.  “Can’t ye understand plain English?  I say I stole the money, and I meant to steal it.  Don’t let me have to tell ye that any more.  I’ll go on:  ’The sight of the notes was too sore a temptation for me, and I yielded to it.  And all the more shame to me, for I had considered myself an honest man up to that very hour.  I never thought about the consequences to my Aunt Maldon, nor how I was going to get rid of the notes.  I wanted money bad, and I took it.  As soon as I’d left the house I was stricken with remorse.  I could not decide what to do.  The fact is I had no time to reflect until I was on the steamer, and it was then too late.  Upon arriving at Cape Town I found the cable stating that Aunt Maldon was dead.  I draw a veil over my state of mind, which, however, does not concern you.  I ought to have returned to England at once, but I could not.  I might have sent to Batchgrew and told him to take half of four hundred and fifty pounds off my share of Aunt Maldon’s estate and put it into yours.  But that would not have helped my conscience.  I had it on my conscience, as it might have been on my stomach.  I tried religion, but it was no good to me.  It was between a prayer-meeting and an experience-meeting at Durban that I used part of the ill-gotten money.  I had not touched it till then.  But two days later I got back the very note that I’d spent.  A prey to remorse, I wandered from town to town, trying to do business.’”

III

Rachel stood up.

“Julian!”

It was the first time in her life that she had called him by his Christian name.

“What?”

“Give me that.”  As he hesitated, she added, “I want it.”