We shall see whether the law can force you to
speak. You admit you would go far to avoid the test."
"That's because I shouldn't like to be involved in a raking over of the
affairs of Murray Davenport. To me it would be an unhappy business, I do
admit. The man is best forgotten."
"I'll not have you speak of him so! I love him! and I hold you
answerable to me for your knowledge of his disappearance. I'll find a way
to bring you to account!"
Her tearful vehemence brought a wave of tenderness to his face, a quiver
to his lips. Noting this, Larcher quickly intervened:
"In pity to a woman, don't you think you ought to tell her what you know?
If there's no guilt on your part, the disclosure can't harm you. It will
end her suspense, at least. She will be always unhappy till she knows."
"She will grow out of that feeling," said Turl, still watching her
compassionately, as she dried her eyes and endeavored to regain her
composure.
"No, she won't!" put in Edna Hill, warmly. "You don't know her. I must
say, how any man with a spark of chivalry can sit there and refuse to
divulge a few facts that would end a woman's torture of mind, which she's
been undergoing for months, is too much for me!"
Turl, in manifest perturbation, still gazed at Florence. She fixed her
eyes, out of which all threat had passed, pleadingly upon him.
"If you knew what it meant to me to grant your request," said he, "you
wouldn't make it."
"It can't mean more to you than this uncertainty, this dark mystery, is
to me," said Florence, in a broken voice.
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