In his ears was the
sonorous roar of Piccadilly, the hooting of motor-cars, close at
hand the rustling of a faint wind in the elm trees. It was a
wonderful moment. The nightmare with which he had grappled so
fiercely, which he had overthrown, but whose ghost still
sometimes walked by his side, had lost its chief and most
poignant terror. She had been tricked into the marriage. She
had never cared or pretended to care. The primal horror of that
tragedy which he had figured so often to himself, seemed to have
departed with the thought. Its shadow must always remain, but in
time his conscience would acquiesce in the pronouncement of his
reason. It was the hand of justice, not any human hand, which
had slain Oliver Hilditch.
"What did your father say when he discovered the truth?" he
asked.
"He did not know it until he came to England--on the day that
Oliver Hilditch was acquitted. My husband always pretended that
he had a special mail bag going out to South America, so he took
away all the letters I wrote to my father, and he took care that
I received none except one or two which I know now were
forgeries. He had friends in South America himself who helped
him--one a typist in my father's office, of whom I discovered
afterwards--but that really doesn't matter.
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