CHAPTER IX.

The horror of the situation struck Lynde Pyne with paralyzing force, but his was one of those natures that recovers all the more quickly, the more powerful the blow.

With instinctive kindness he drew the girl's arm through his own, and by his strength steadied her tottering feet.

"Lead the way!" he said to the officer. "We will follow you."

He turned to Leonie, all his heart seeming to glow through his eyes.

"Do not fear," he whispered. "I will save you. My poor girl, my suffering one, you must trust me, and know that your sorrows are mine. I will bring you back here within the hour. You trust me, do you not?"

She was too much dazed to reply. All intellectuality seemed frozen in her. She was scarcely conscious of what he had been speaking.

He hurried her onward that he might return with her all the sooner, drawing her arm yet closer within his own protectingly.

Once upon the street, he called a carriage, and together with the officer, they entered it.

He spoke but once to her on the way to the station-house, and then she did not reply. He attempted no further conversation, but watched her fearfully, noting with horror the stoniness of her countenance.

She seemed to be unconscious of her surroundings when she was placed in the narrow cell, and when they came to her again some time later, they found her in the exact position in which she had been left. Not a muscle seemed to have been disturbed.

Lynde Pyne entered there with an officer. He took her by the hand, and gently lifted her to her feet.

"Come," he said, gently, "we will return to your home again."

Some intelligence struggled to her eyes.

"I am no longer a prisoner, then?" she asked, dully.

"No!"

"Will you explain it to me?"

"There is so very little to explain! When we get home----"

"No, now! You need not be afraid to tell me the worst. If anything could have killed me or driven me mad, I should be dead to this suffering now. Has--that man withdrawn the charge he made against me?"

"N--o!" stammered Pyne.

"I see! You forget that my experience has been in the office of a lawyer. How much bail was required?"

The interrogation was put to the officer, and not to Pyne.

Disregarding, or not seeing the glance of warning from the latter, he answered with the customary indifference of his class:

"Fifteen hundred."

Leonie groaned. Something in her face sent a quick thrill of apprehension through Pyne, but as she fell back immediately into the old apathy, he said nothing.

Silently he led her to the waiting carriage, and they were driven again to that house wherein death reigned. Wearily Leonie dragged herself up the long, steep flight and into the room where she had only that morning--but how long ago it seemed--heard the hideous story of her mother's shame.

She started to the room in which lay the body of her beloved dead, but a solemn-faced man met her at the door and told her gently but clearly that she could not enter.

She made no resistance, but allowed Lynde Pyne to close the door and place her in a chair beside the open window.

Her faculties seemed to be entirely restored, but not a tear relieved the terrible brilliancy of her eyes.

With the death of hope and the birth of despair, had come a calm that had the appearance of stoicism.

Lynde Pyne kneeled beside her, and taking the small cold hands in his, chafed them tenderly.

"Leonie," he said gently, "I wish that you would trust me, dear! I wish that you would remember that there is nothing in all this world that I would not do for you if you would only let me. I wish that you would try to think there is no trouble that I would not bear for you, if by so doing, I could relieve you of sorrow. You know that I would do that, do you not?"

She bowed her head upon his hand, but neither sigh nor moan escaped her.

"Child, you cannot bear this sorrow alone. Why will you not trust me?"

"Because I cannot. It is part of the curse that is upon me that I must suffer in silence. There is only one thing, and if you would promise that, there would be a load lifted from my heart--a load of shame! What am I saying? You must not listen to me, but---- You know that I love you, do you not?"

"Yes, I know that," he answered, with a curious intonation.

"Well, listen! There are reasons that make it impossible for me to be your wife, but"--holding his hands in a grasp like iron and looking into his eyes with an earnestness that was terrible--"it would kill me--to see--another--in the place--that honor--forbids me--to accept. Lynde! Lynde! promise me, swear to me that you will not make Evelyn Chandler your wife!"

She had arisen and was standing over him, her hands still holding his, her wild eyes gazing into his with a fierceness that was startling.

He arose slowly and stood before her.

"You wish me to break my word without cause!" he said, gently. "Give me some reason for it. Let me say to Miss Chandler that I have been mistaken, that I love another, and that that other will be my wife, with her permission, and I consent. How could I go to her and tell her that I must have my promise back without an excuse to offer?"

"I don't know; but if you love me, if you would save me from a madhouse, you will find a way. Lynde, promise me!"

"Tell me, Leonie, what had Evelyn Chandler to do with this robbery?"

He spoke the words slowly and impressively. She started, and for the moment seemed about to faint, but quickly recovered herself.

"Nothing!" she answered, in a ghastly sort of whisper.

"Don't you know that they will force it from you upon the witness stand? Don't you know that the most minute examination will be made into your life and antecedents and hers? Do you think you can conceal a fact from these men where a family like that is concerned? Why, there will not be an incident from your birth to the present day that they will not discover----"

"Hush! You are driving me mad! I will find a way to prevent that if I must seek death to do it. Oh, my God----"

In her frightful excitement she might have told him all she knew and saved herself from the terrible time that followed, had not the door opened, and the undertaker entered.

"If you wish, Miss Cuyler," he said, gently, "you may come in now."

Bowed, broken in spirit, heart-sore and weary, she followed him.

Mechanically, Lynde Pyne was about to follow her, when a messenger entered bearing a note addressed to himself.

He tore it open and read:

"Come to your office at once. I must see you.

"LEONARD CHANDLER."