The words slipped out in a sharp tone, not quite nervous, but thin and worn. Miriam's attitude grew tense. Ford took a step forward from the fireside. With his arm flung over the back of his chair, and his knee resting on the seat of it, he strained across the table, as if to annihilate the space between Wayne and himself.
The blind man nodded. When he spoke it was again into the air.
"Yes; I knew. You're Norrie Ford. I ought to say I've only known it latterly--about a fortnight now."
"Oh, it just came to me--by degrees, I think."
"I thought I wouldn't. It has worried me, but I thought I'd keep still."
"Do you mean that you were going to let everything--go on?"
"I weighed all the considerations. That's the decision I came to. You must understand," he went on to explain, in a voice that was now tremulous as well as thin, "that I'd had you a good deal on my mind, during these past eight years. I sentenced you to death when I almost knew you were innocent. It was my duty. I couldn't help it. The facts told dead against you. Every one admitted that. True, the evidence might have been twisted to tell against old Gramm and his wife, but they hadn't been dissipated, and they hadn't been indicted, and they hadn't gone round making threats against Chris Ford's life like you."
"I didn't mean them. It was nothing but a boy's rage--"
"Yes, but you made them; and when the old man was found--But I'll not go into that now. I only want to say that, while I couldn't acquit you with my intelligence, I felt constrained to do it in my heart, especially when everything was over, and it was too late. The incident has been the one thing in my professional career that I've most regretted. I don't quite blame myself. I had to do my duty. And yet it was a relief to me when you got away. I don't know that I could have acted differently, but--but I liked you. I've gone on liking you. I've often thought about you, and wondered what had become of you. And one day--not long ago--as I was going over the old ground once more, I saw I'd been thinking about--_you_. That's how it came to me."
"And you were going to remain silent, and let me marry Evie?"
"I saw what was to be said against it. But I weighed all the evidence carefully. You were an injured man; you'd made a great fight and you'd won--as far as one man can win against the world. I came to the conclusion that I wasn't called on to strike you down a second time, after you'd scrambled up so pluckily. Evie is very dear to me; I don't say that I should see her married to you without some misgiving; but I decided that you deserved her. It was a great responsibility to take, but I took it and made up my mind to--let her go."