"No, don't attempt to excuse yourself, mother! If you had taken my advice, and turned your wax doll out upon the world to look out for herself, this would never have happened! But no, you must saddle yourself with the charge of her, and pamper her as foolishly as her uncle did! And now you see the result of your blind folly. It needed but one sight of her baby-face by that old dotard to ruin my prospects for life. I hope you are satisfied with your work!"

It was ten o'clock at night, and Felise Herbert had come into her mother's room in her dressing-gown, with her dark hair hanging over her shoulders, and her eyes flashing angrily, to upbraid her mother for her weakness in the matter of Bonnibel Vere.

"You should have turned her adrift upon the world," she repeated, stamping her slippered foot angrily. "She might have starved to death for all I cared! After all I did for you, I think you could have done that much to please me!"

"But, Felise, you know it was quite impossible to take such extreme measures without incurring the censure of the world, and perhaps its suspicion!" said Mrs. Arnold, deprecatingly.

"Who cares for suspicion—they could not prove anything!" said Felise, snapping her fingers.

"No, perhaps not," Mrs. Arnold answered, "but all the same, I should not like to run the risk. You are blinded by anger,[Pg 41] Felise; or you would reason more clearly. You know I did not want to keep the girl here. I hate her as much as you do. I have hated her ever since she was born, but you know I dare not turn her off. Society would taboo us if we dared hint such a thing. Turn a girl of her aristocratic antecedents out upon the world to earn her living, while I am rolling in wealth! A girl who knows no more of the world than a baby! The daughter of General Vere, the niece of my dead husband! Felise, you must see that it would never do!"

"It would if I had been suffered to have my way," answered the girl, marching angrily up and down the floor. "To be thwarted this way in my prospect of making the most brilliant match of the season is too bad! It is shameful! For her to step into my place this way makes me hate her worse than ever!"

"But, Felise, she cannot step into your place, my dear. Did you not tell me you had learned from Leslie Dane's intercepted letters that the girl was secretly married to him? Why did you meddle with their correspondence, anyway? Why not have let him come back in time to claim her? She would then have been out of your way!"

"Mother, you talk like a fool!" exclaimed the daughter, angrily. "You know I dare not let Leslie Dane return here! I am compelled to keep him out of the country for the sake of my own safety. I am compelled to separate the two because he must not hear of the charge of murder that we made against him. If she should hear it, as she is likely to do at any time, and should communicate it to him, what would be the consequence? He would return here and disprove the charge at once. Bonnibel was with him that night. They went to Brandon and were married while your husband was being mur—— put out of the way. He could prove an alibi at once. You talk of suspicion—where would suspicion fall then?"

"Surely not on us, Felise!" said Mrs. Arnold, fearfully.

"And why not?" sneered the girl. "If the now quiescent subject were agitated again what absurd theories might not be propounded by the suspicious world? Who can tell whether Wild Madge could keep the secret? I tell you I have only consulted our vital interests in separating Leslie Dane and Bonnibel Vere, though to do so I have had to destroy my every prospect of becoming the millionaire's wife. I am compelled to keep that beggarly artist out of the country at any cost."

"But, my dear, there is no chance of Bonnibel marrying Colonel Carlyle even though she should be separated forever from her artist-husband, for she is a married woman anyhow. One hint of thi............