He looked at her.  “How do you know it?”

She wrung her hands together.  “Oh, I have no proof!  Can’t you believe me without proof?”

He was watching her intently.  “I believe in your sincerity, of course,” he said.  “But I am afraid I don’t share your conviction.”

“But you must—­you must!” she cried.  “I know him better than you do.  I know him to be incapable of the tiniest speck of dishonour.  I swear that he is innocent!  I swear it!  I swear it!”

He put out a restraining hand.  “Chris, don’t say any more!  You are only upsetting yourself to no purpose.  Come, child, it is useless to go on—­quite useless.”

She flung out her arms with a gesture of utter despair.  “You won’t believe me?”

He turned to lock up his cheque-book.  “I have answered that question already,” he said, without impatience.

She drew near to him.  Her blue eyes burned with a feverish light.  Her face was haggard.  “Trevor, what would you say if—­if—­I told you he were shielding someone—­if I told you he were shielding—­me?” Her voice sank upon the word.

He turned sharply round, so sharply that she shrank.  But he made no movement towards her.  He only looked full and piercingly into her face.  At the end of ten seconds he spoke, so calmly that his voice sounded cold.

“I am afraid I shouldn’t believe you.”

His eyes fell away from her with the words.  He dropped his keys into his pocket and switched off the light from his writing-table.

Chris was shivering again, shivering from head to foot.  She could barely keep her teeth from chattering.  He came to her and put his arm round her.

She glanced up at him nervously, but his quiet face told her nothing.  Almost involuntarily she suffered him to lead her from the room.

CHAPTER VI

WHEN LOVE DEMANDS A SACRIFICE

When Chris awoke, the morning sunshine was streaming in through the open windows, and she was alone.  She came back to full remembrance slowly, as one toiling along a difficult road.  Her brain felt very tired.  She lay vaguely listening to the gay trill of a robin on the terrace below, dreading the moment when the dull ache at her heart should turn to active pain.

A cheery whistle on the gravel under her windows roused her at last.  She took up her burden again with a great sigh.

“O God!” she whispered, as she turned her heavy head upon the pillow, “do let me die soon—­do let me die soon!”

But there was no voice nor any that answered.

Wearily at length she raised herself.  It was curious how ill she felt. 
She looked longingly back at her pillow.

At the same instant the gay whistle in the garden gave place to a cracked shout.  “Hullo, Chris!  Aren’t you going to get up to-day?  Do you know what time it is?”

She started, and looked at her watch.  Ten o’clock!  In amazement and consternation she sprang from the bed.  Bertrand was to leave in the morning; so Trevor had told her.  She must—­she must—­see him before he left!  Doubtless Trevor had hoped that she would sleep on till the afternoon, and so miss him.  How little he knew!  How little he understood!