ch the color was
beginning to flow naturally again--parted just enough to reveal the
milk-white teeth between them.

When the man outside asserted his right to come to her, the only sign
she had made was a little toss of her golden-crowned head, indicative
of defiance, while about the corners of her lovely mouth there lurked
a smile of scorn that would have been maddening to Emil Correlli could
he have seen it.

At last a discontented muttering and the sound of retreating steps in
the hall told her that her persecutor had become discouraged, and
gone. Then, with a sigh of relief, she sank back upon her pillow
feeling both weak and weary from excitement.

Left alone once more, she fell into deep thought.

In spite of a feeling of despair which, at times, surged over her in
view of the trying position in which she found herself, the base
deception practiced upon her, aroused a spirit of indomitable
resistance, to battle for herself and her outraged feelings, and
outwit, if possible, these enemies of her peace.

"They have done this wicked thing--that woman and her brother," she
said to herself; "they have cunningly plotted to lure me into this
trap; but, though they have succeeded in fettering me for life, that
is all the satisfaction that they will ever reap from their scheme.
They cannot compel me, against my will, to live with a man whom I
abhor. Even though I stood up before that multitude last evening, and
appeared a willing actor in that disgraceful sacrilegious scene, no
one can make me abide by it, and I shall denounce and defy them both;
the world shall at least ring with scorn for their deed, even though I
cannot free myself by proving a charge of fraud against them. But,
oh--"

The proud little head suddenly drooped, and with a moan of pain she
covered her convulsed face with her hands, as her thoughts flew to a
certain room in New York, where she had spent one happy, blissful week
in learning to love, with all her soul, the man whom she had served.

She had believed, as we know, that her love for Royal Bryant was
hopeless--at least she had told herself so, and that she could never
link her fate with his, after learning of her shameful origin.

Yet, now that there appeared to have arisen an even greater barrier,
she began to realize that all hope had not been quite dead--that, in
her heart, she had all the time been nursing a tender shoot of
affection, and a faint belief that her lover would never rel