is arm.

"I see. Do not tell me mere suspicions; they might cruelly wrong an
innocent person; and I ought not to have asked the question."

"My hesitation arose from a totally different source, and I was merely
wondering whether you, my sweet saint, could believe that a woman
committed the bloody deed."

"Oh, Mr. Dunbar, impossible! A woman guilty of taking that old man's
life? The supposition is as horrible as the crime itself."

Passing his hand lightly over her crimped fair hair, and looking down
into her eyes, as brown as the back of a thrush, her lover replied:

"I find that the nobler and purer a woman's heart is, the less she
credits the existence of vice and the possibility of crime among her
own sex. You doubtless consider the Brinvilliers, Fredegonds, Fulvias
and Faustinas, quite as fabulous as Centaurs, Sirens and Were-wolves;
and I feel as reluctant to shake your fair faith in womanhood, as to
dash the dew from a rose-bud, or rudely brush the bloom a cluster of
tempting grapes; but the grim truth must be told, that our old friend
was robbed and murdered by a woman."

"One of his servants? They all seemed devotedly attached to him."

"No, by his granddaughter, a young and very beautiful woman; Beryl
Brentano, the child of General Darrington's daughter Ellice, whom he
had disowned on account of her wretched marriage with a foreigner, who
taught her music and the languages. Of course you have heard from your
aunt and uncle all the details of that family episode. Yesterday this
girl Beryl suddenly presented herself at Elm Bluff, and demanded money
from her grandfather; alleging that her mother's life was in danger for
want of it. I learn there was a stormy interview, part of the
conversation having been overheard by two persons; and the General, who
was as vindictive as a Modoc, or a Cossack, drove the young lady
through a door leading down to the rosery. This occurred in the
afternoon, immediately after I left Elm Bluff, where I went to obtain
his signature to a deed to some lands recently sold in Texas. I saw the
girl sitting on the front steps, and when she rose and looked at me,
her superb physique impressed me powerfully. She is as beautiful and
stately as some goddess stepping out of the Norse 'Edda', and
altogether a remarkable looking person. It will appear in evidence,
that the General harshly refused her pleadings, and made a point of
assuring her that his will, already prepared, would forever d