“Mr. Lightwood, I assure you I have no disposition to deny it, or intention to deny it. I should have continued to avoid you, in pursuance of the same set purpose, for a short time longer, if we had not met now. I am going straight home, and shall remain at home to-morrow until noon. Hereafter, I hope we may be better acquainted. Good-day.”

Lightwood stood irresolute, but Bella’s husband passed him in the steadiest manner, with Bella on his arm; and they went home without encountering any further remonstrance or molestation from any one.

When they had dined and were alone, John Rokesmith said to his wife, who had preserved her cheerfulness: “And you don’t ask me, my dear, why I bore that name?”

“No, John love. I should dearly like to know, of course;” (which her anxious face confirmed;) “but I wait until you can tell me of your own free will. You asked me if I could have perfect faith in you, and I said yes, and I meant it.”

It did not escape Bella’s notice that he began to look triumphant. She wanted no strengthening in her firmness; but if she had had need of any, she would have derived it from his kindling face.

“You cannot have been prepared, my dearest, for such a discovery as that this mysterious Mr. Handford was identical with your husband?”

“No, John dear, of course not. But you told me to prepare to be tried, and I prepared myself.”

He drew her to nestle closer to him, and told her it would soon be over, and the truth would soon appear. “And now,” he went on, “lay stress, my dear, on these words that I am going to add. I stand in no kind of peril, and I can by possibility be hurt at no one’s hand.”

“You are quite, quite sure of that, John dear?”

“Not a hair of my head! Moreover, I have done no wrong, and have injured no man. Shall I swear it?”

“No, John!” cried Bella, laying her hand upon his lips, with a proud look. ’Never to me!”

“But circumstances,” he went on “—I can, and I will, disperse them in a moment — have surrounded me with one of the strangest suspicions ever known. You heard Mr. Lightwood speak of a dark transaction?”

“Yes, John.”

“You are prepared to hear explicitly what he meant?”

“Yes, John.”

“My life, he meant the murder of John Harmon, your allotted husband.”

With a fast palpitating heart, Bella grasped him by the arm. “You cannot be suspected, John?”

“Dear love, I can be — for I am!”

There was silence between them, as she sat looking in his face, with the colour quite gone from her own face and lips. “How dare they!” she cried at length, in a burst of generous indignation. “My beloved husband, how dare they!”

He caught her in his arms as she opened hers, and held her to his heart. “Even knowing this, you can trust me, Bella?”

“I can trust you, John dear, with all my soul. If I could not trust you, I should fall dead at your feet.”