way of repairing a fault was to hide it: to tear up the floor and bury the
victim at night. Above all, no coroner and no autopsy!

She began to feel a strange interest in her distant cousin. "And his
wife--did she know what he had done?"

Mr. Orme stared. His moral pointed, he had returned to the contemplation of
his own affairs.

"His wife? Oh, of course not. The secret has been most admirably kept; but
her property was put in trust, so she's quite safe with him."

Her property! Kate wondered if her faith in her husband had also been
put in trust, if her sensibilities had been protected from his possible
inroads.

"Do you think it quite fair to have deceived her in that way?"

Mr. Orme gave her a puzzled glance: he had no taste for the by-paths of
ethical conjecture.

"His people wanted to give the poor fellow another chance; they did the
best they could for him."

"And--he has done nothing dishonourable since?"

"Not that I know of: the last I heard was that they had a little boy,
and that he was quite happy. At that distance he's not likely to bother
_us_, at all events."