When you think it over, you will understand why
he could not tell you; for he had no actual proof, save the dying
girl's words and what I had seen and heard; and his motive in
telling it might have been misunderstood. But he told me that, even
at the risk of that, he should feel it his duty, if you became
engaged to that villain, to tell the story to Lady Greendale.
"But if he found it hard to speak, there seemed to me no reason why
I shouldn't. Except my father and mother and he, no one knows that
I was well nigh a murderer. And though he has so generously
forgiven me, and I have in a small way tried to show my gratitude
to him, it was still painful to me to have to tell the story to
anyone else. But I felt that I ought to do it--not for his sake,
because he has told me that what I had looked for and what he had
so hoped for is not to be--but because I thought that you ought not
to be allowed to sacrifice your life to such a man; and partly,
too, because I wished to spare my dear master the pain of telling
the story, and of perhaps being misunderstood."
"Thank you, George," she said, quietly. "You have done quite right
in telling--"
At this moment some voices were heard at the other end of the
garden.
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