to him eagerly.
“Has anything happened?” he demanded.
The boy's face, which was always so like his sister's, had the same despair in it now. “Don't know of anything that's happened,” he returned, surlily.
“What ails Madelon?”
“I tell you I don't know.” Richard would say no more. He blew out his candle and tumbled into bed, turned his face to the window and lay awake until and hour before dawn. Then he arose, dressed himself, and went down-stairs. He put more wood on the hearth fire, then knelt down before it, and puffed out his boyish cheeks at the bellows until the new flames crept through the smoke. Then he lighted the lantern, and went to the barn to milk and feed the stock. That was always Richard's morning task, and he always on his way thither replenished the hearth fire, that his sister Madelon might have a lighter and speedier task at preparing breakfast. Madelon usually arose a half-hour after Richard, and she was not behindhand this morning. She entered the great living-room, lit the candles, and went about getting breakfast. Human daily needs arise and set on tragedy as remorselessly as the sun.
Madelon Hautville, who had washed but a few hours ago the stain of murder from her hand, in whose heart was an unsounded depth of despair, mixed up the corn-meal daintily with cream, and baked the cakes which her father and brothers loved before the fire, and laid the table. She had always attended to the needs of the males of her family with the stern faithfulness of an Indian squaw. Now, as she worked, the wonder, softer than her other emotions, was upon her as to how they would get on when she was in prison and after she was dead; for she made no doubt that she had killed Lot Gordon and the sheriff would be there presently for her, and she felt plainly the fretting of the rope around her soft neck. She hoped they would not come for her until breakfast was prepared and eaten, the dishes cleared away, and the house tidied; but she listened like a savage for a foot-fall and a hand at the door. She had packed a little bundle ready to take with her before she left her chamber. Her cloak and hood were laid out on the bed.
When she sat down at the table with her father and brothers, all of them except Richard and Louis stared at her with open amazement and questioned her. Richard and Louis stared furtively at their sister's face, as stiff, set, and pale as if she were dead, but they asked no questions. Madelon said, in a voice that was not hers, that she was not sick, and put pieces of Indian cake into her untasting mouth and listened. But breakfast was well over and the dishes put away before anybody came. And then it was not the sheriff to hale her to prison on a charge of murder, but an old man from the village big with news.
He was a relative of the Hautvilles, an uncle on the mother's side, old and broken, scarcely able to find his feeble way on his shrunken legs through the snow; but, with the instinct of gossip, the sharp nose for his neighbors' affairs, still alert in him, he had arisen at dawn to canvass the village, and had come thither at first, since he anticipated that he might possibly have the delight of bringing the intelligence before any of the family had heard it elsewhere. He came in, dragging his old, snow-laden feet, tapping heavily with his stout stick, and settled, cackling, into a chair.
“Heard the news?” queried Uncle Luke basset, his eyes, like black sparks, twinkling rapidly at all their faces.
Madelon set the cups and saucers on the dresser.
“We don't have any time for anybody's business but our own,” quoth David Hautville, gruffly. He did not like his wife's uncle. He was tightening a string in his bass-viol; he pulled it as he spoke, and it gave out a fierce twang. Louis sat moodily over the fire with his painful arm in wet bandages. Richard was whittling kindling-wood, with nervous speed, beside him. Eugene and Abner were cleaning their guns. They all looked at the eager old man except Richard and Louis and Madelon.
“Burr Gordon has killed Lot so's to get his property,” proclaimed the old man, and his voice broke with eager delight and importance.
Madelon gave a cry and sprang forward in front of him. “It's a lie!” she shouted.
The old man laughed in her face. “No, 'tain't, Madelon. You're showin' a Christian sperrit to stan' up for him when he's jilted ye for another gal, but 'tain't a lie. His knife, with his name on to it, was a-stickin' out of Lot's side.”
“It's a lie! I killed him with my brother Richard's knife!”
The old man shrank back before her in incredulous horror. The great bass-viol fell to the ground like a woman as David strode forward and Abner and Eugene turned their shocked, white faces from their guns.
“I killed him with Richard's knife,” repeated Madelon.
Richard got up and came around before her, thrusting his hand in his pocket. He pulled out his own clasp-knife, and brandished it in her face. “Here is my knife,” he cried, fiercely—“my knife, with my name cut in the handle. Say you killed Lot Gordon with it again!”
Madelon snatched the knife out of her brother's hand and looked at it with straining eyes. There, indeed, was a rude “R. H.” cut in the horn handle. She gasped. “What does this mean?” she cried out.
“It means you have lost your wits,” answered Richard, contemptuously; but his eyes on his sister's face were full of pleading agony.
“What knife did you give me when I started home last night?”
“I gave you no knife.”
Old Luke Basset asserted himself again. “The gal's lost her balance,” he said. “It was Burr Gordon's knife, with his name cut into it, that was stickin' out of Lot Gordon's side.”
“Is Lot Gordon dead?” Louis demanded, hoarsely.
“No, he ain't dead, but the doctor thinks he can't live long. Ephraim Steele and Eleazer Hooper were a-goin' home from the ball when they come right on Lot layin' side of the road and Burr a-tryin' to draw his knife out, so it shouldn't testify against him.”
“It's a lie!” Madelon groaned. “Burr Gordon did not kill him. It was I! He met me, and tried to—kiss me, and—the knife was in my hand—Richard made me take it because I was coming home alone, and there had been rumors of a bear.”
“I did not,” persisted Richard, doggedly. “I did not make her take my knife. Here is my knife, with my name cut in the handle.”
Madelon turned on him fiercely. “You did, you know you did!” said she.
“Here is my knife, with my name cut on the handle.”
“You gave me a knife as I was coming out of the tavern.”
“No, I did not.”
“You did, and I killed him with it. It was not Burr! I ran for help, and I met Burr, and I told him what I had done, and he went back with me to Lot. Then he sent me home when he heard somebody coming. Ask Lot Gordon if I did not kill him; if he can speak he can tell you.”
“There won't neither him nor Burr say a word,” said the old man, “but there was Burr's knife a-stickin' into Lot's side, with his name cut into it.”
Madelon turned sharply to Louis. “You saw the blood on my hand when I was rubbing your arm last night,” she said.
He made no reply, but stared gloomily at the fire.
“Louis, you saw Lot Gordon's blood
