be compelled to punish someone whom I loved most dearly? Had Fate
been so cruel to me, that I had learned to cling most in my Second
State to the very criminal whose act had blotted out my First? Had I
grown to treat like a mother my father's murderer?

Aunt Emma's hand! Aunt Emma's hand! That was Aunt Emma's hand, every
touch and every line of it. But no! where were the marks, those
well-known marks on the palm? I took up the big magnifying-glass
with which I had often scanned that photograph close before. Not a
sign or a trace of them. I shut my eyes, and called up again the
mental Picture of the murder. I looked hard at the phantom-hand in
it, that floated like a vision, all distinct before my mind's eye.
It was flat and smooth and white. Not a scar--not a sign on it. I
turned round to Jane, that too natural detective.

"No, no!" I cried hastily, with a quick tone of triumph. "Aunt
Emma's hand is marked on the palm with great gashes and cuts. This
one's smooth as smooth can be. And so's the one I can see in the
Picture within me!"

Jane drew back with a startled air, and opened her mouth, all agog,
to let in a deep breath.

"The wall!" she said slowly. "The bottle-glass, don't you know! The
blood on the top! Whoever did it, climbed over and tore his hands.
Or HER hands, if it was a woman! That would account for the gashes."

This was more than I could endure. The coincidence was too crushing.
I bent down my head on my arms and cried silently, bitterly. I hated
Jane in my heart for even suggesting it. Yet I couldn't deny to