The colour rose to the young man's pallid face; he leant back and, with narrowed eyes, regarded her, for the first time, with curiosity and interest. It may be said that, up to that moment, he had not realized her personality; she was just a something, a nuisance in the shape of a girl, which had come between him and a shameful death. Of course, he had seen Celia in the corridor now and again, had noticed vaguely that his opposite neighbour was young and graceful and pretty—no man, especially one of his age, could fail to notice such palpable facts—but he had been too absorbed in his own affairs to take any interest in her. Now, surprised by her courage, he regarded her curiously, and he saw that she was not only pretty, but quite beautiful. He took in the clear oval of her face, the soft waves of dark hair which garlanded the low forehead, puckered now by lines of decision, the blue-grey eyes almost violet in the intensity of her gaze, the lips which, he felt, could smile with infinite tenderness, though now set tightly.

Yes; this young woman who had come at the sound of his groan of despair, who now sat opposite him, gripping the revolver which she had forced from his hand, was very beautiful, and, obviously, very brave; he saw, too, that she was a lady, that she was different from most of the girls who lived in the Buildings. In that flash of scrutiny, he took in even the details of her dress, and knew that, plain as it was, it had come from a good house, probably from Paris itself; there were no cheap rings on the well-formed, but not too small, hands; he realized that he was confronting the embodiment of the three qualities most desirable—youth, beauty, strength; and he was conscious of a reluctant thrill of admiration. His eyes sank, and, involuntarily, he sighed. For he was thinking of another woman.

"Did you hear what I said?" asked Celia, in a low voice, one a trifle more gentle, though it was still firm. "I said that I don't believe you."

"Yes; I heard," he responded, with a listless smile of irony; "but I am afraid twelve good men in a box—the jury, you know—would not be so incredulous. May I ask why you refuse to accept my plea of guilty? Not that it matters!"

Celia's brows drew together, and she looked as if she were somewhat embarrassed and puzzled by the question; at last, after a pause, she replied, woman-like,

"You don't look like one."

"Quite so," he said, with deeper irony. "That is essentially a feminine reason. Of course, your idea of a forger is the theatrical one; the gentleman with a Mephistophelian face, a sardonic sneer, evening dress, with a big cloak, and a cigarette in the corner of his mouth; the villain who looks every inch the part and says 'Curse you!' whenever it is possible to do so. My dear young lady, your ignorance of the world spoils your compliment. The worst man, the biggest criminal I ever saw in the dock, looked as innocent as a baby."

"All the same, I don't believe you," Celia declared, doggedly.

"I am sorry to say the court is not with you," he said, with a smile that did not hide his bitterness. "The cheque was cashed by the prisoner—myself, my lord.—You see, I accept you as judge.—When he was asked to give an account of it, he refused to do so; I am speaking in the past tense, but I am merely forecasting the course of the trial. A man who cashes a forged cheque and declines to say where he got it, how it came into his possession, is quickly disposed of by a British jury, than which there is no body of men more acute and intelligent."

"Why do you refuse to tell the truth and clear yourself?" asked Celia, in a low voice, her lips parted now, with a perplexity, a vivid interest.

He rose, strode up and down the room for a moment or two, then came back to the table, and, with his hands pressing hard on it, looked down at her upturned, anxious face.

"Your belief, your persistent, unreasoning belief in me, upsets me," he said, with a smile, and evidently still making an effort to retain his assumption of cynical indifference and levity. "I am strongly tempted by it to tell you 'my story,' as the bores on the stage say; but I can't. However, I will admit that you are right. I did not forge the accursed thing—I beg your pardon! No, I didn't sign the cheque; but the case, so far as I am concerned, is just as black as if I were guilty. Hold on a minute! I know what you are going to say; that I am sacrificing myself——"

"You have no right to do so," Celia broke in, in a voice that trembled, not only with pity, but with indignation. "Oh, don't you see! I am only a girl, and I know so little of the world; but I know, I am as sure as I am that—that I am standing here, you have no right, no one has any right, to make such a sacrifice, and certainly no one would be justified in accepting it." She pushed the hair from her forehead with a gesture of impatience. "Oh, you must be mad! You—you look so clever, you take it all so calmly; you are not excited, bewildered—don't you see yourself that, in consenting to ruin yourself, to go to—to prison, an innocent man——? Oh, you have not realized——"

"Have I not?" he broke in, grimly, and with a significant glance at the revolver. "Oh, yes; I realize it clearly enough; it was because I did that I decided to—slip out of it. I am sorry that you prevented me. It was good of you; it was brave of you; you meant well. And you have succeeded. It is a case of the interposing angel; but you have placed me in a terrible fix. I don't know what I am going to do."

His hands fell to his side with a gesture of helplessness and despair, and he turned his head away from the searching gaze of the clear eyes regarding him so intently.

"Tell the truth," said Celia, in an urgent whisper. "Why should you screen the guilty? Why should you suffer in his place? Oh, I don't want to hear the story, it does not concern me. But if you told it to me, it would make no difference, it would not alter my opinion that you intend to do a very wicked things—and a very foolish one."

"Foolish! That hits me rather hard," he commented, with a wry smile.

"Well, it is foolish," said Celia, emphatically. "Why, look how young you are!"

"Why, how young do you think I am?" he interrupted, looking down at her with a grave smile. "As I said just now, you seem to regard me as if I were a boy. I think I am as old as you—older. How old are you—you look like a girl?"

"I am twenty-two—but what has that to do with it? How can you turn aside, trifle——"

"And I am twenty-five," he said, with an involuntary sigh. "So you see I am your senior. But they say a woman is always ten years older than a man of the same age. I suppose that is why you always have us under your thumbs. No, I'm not trifling. Don't you see that I am fighting for time, that I am trying not to think, that I am putting the thing from me as far as I can, even for a few minutes. Immediately you go, I shall have to face it all again, and—alone. You have been very good to me; you don't think I am ungrateful, because I—I play the fool?"

"Don't play it any longer, then," said Celia, earnestly. "Make up your mind to do the right thing. Why should you ruin yourself? But I have said that before. You know I am right; you say you are grateful because I have stopped you from——" She shuddered, and her hand closed still more tightly on the revolver. "Promise me——"

He looked at her wistfully; but he shook his head.

"I can't do that," he said, in a low voice. "Here, I see I shall have to put the case to you." He sank into the chair and leant his head on his hand, and, still with his eyes covered, he continued, in little more than a whisper: "Supposing there was someone you cared for more than anything else in the world, more than life, more than honour. Is there someone?"

Celia did not blush, and without a sign of embarrassment, shook her head.

"I beg your pardon for asking. I am sorry there is not; because, you see, you would understand more readily. Well, there is someone I care for like that, and I am doing this to save her—I mean him," he corrected quickly, "from all that I should suffer if I stood up and faced the music, as you want me to do."

"Whoever she is, she is not worth it," said Celia, her voice thrilling with indignation and scorn.

"I said 'him,'" he corrected, almost inaudibly.

"You said 'her,' first," retorted Celia. "Of course, it's a woman—and a wicked, a selfish one. No woman who had a spark of goodness in her would accept such a sacrifice."

"You wrong her," he said. "There are always exceptions, circumstances, to govern every case. In this case, she does not know. I tell you that, if I take your advice, I should blast the life of the woman I—I love."

"Then you are screening a man for her sake?" said Celia.

"That's it," he admitted; "and you would do the same, if you stood in my place. Oh, you would say you would not; perhaps you think at this moment you would not; but you would. You're just the sort of girl to do it." He laughed again, bitterly. "Why, one has only to look at you——"

For the first time, Celia coloured, and her eyes dropped. As if ashamed of having caused her embarrassment, he bit his lip, and muttered, "I have been offensive, I am afraid. But you see how it is? And now you know the truth, have guessed something of it, you will see that I have either to face the music, plead guilty to the charge and go to prison, or get out of it by the only way."

It was she who hid her face now. He saw that she was trembling; he knew that she was struggling with her tears; he went round to her and laid his hand on her shoulder, very gently, almost reverently. "Don't cry," he said. "I'm not worth it. I am sorry you should be so distressed. I wish—for your sake, now—that you had not come in. Hadn't you better go now?"

Celia rose; her cheeks were wet, her lips were quivering.

"What—what will you do?" she asked, fighting with a sob.

He met her eyes moodily. Celia held her breath; then, with a sudden tightening of the lips, a flash of the eyes, he said, grimly, as if every word cost him an effort,

"I will face it."

With a gasp of relief, and yet with infinite pity and sorrow in her eyes, she flung out both hands to him.

He took them in his, which were burning now, and gripped them tightly.

"My God! what a woman you are," he said, with a sudden uplifting of the brows. "Someone else will find that out some day."

Celia drew her hands away and moved to the door. As he opened it for her, his glance fell on the revolver she had laid on the table.

"You have forgotten," he said, with a mirthless smile. "Hadn't you better take it with you?"

She looked straight into his eyes, not in doubt, but with infinite trust and confidence.

"No," she said; and with the word, she passed out.