plant
you--"

"Yes, 'the woman--she gavest me and I did eat,'" interposed his
companion, with a scathing ring of scorn in the words. "That is always
the cry of cowards like you, when they find themselves worsted by
their own folly," she went on, indignantly. "Woman must always bear
the scorpion lash of blame from her betrayer while the world also
awards her only shame and ostracism from society, if she yields to the
persuasive voice of her charmer, admiring and believing in him and
allowing him to go unsmirched by the venomous breath of scandal. It is
only his victim--his innocent victim oftentimes, as in my case--who
suffers; he is greeted everywhere with open arms and flattering
smiles, even though he repeats his offenses again and again."

"Isabel! spare me!"

"No, I will not spare you," she continued, sternly. "You know, Gerald
Goddard, that I was a pure and innocent girl when you tempted me to
leave my father's house and flee with you to Italy. You were older
than I, by eight years; you had seen much of the world, and you knew
your power. You cunningly planned that secret marriage, which you
intended from the first should be only a farce, but which, I have
learned since, was in every respect a legal ceremony--"

"Ha! I thought so!" cried her companion, with a sudden shock. "When
did you hear?--who told you?"

"I met your friend, Will Forsyth, only two years ago--just before my
return to this country--and when I took him to task for the shameful
part which he had played to assist you in carrying out your
ignominious plot, telling him that you had owned to his being
disguised as an aged minister to perform the sacrilegious ceremony, he
confessed to me that, at the last moment, his heart had failed him,
whereupon he went to an old clergyman, a friend of his father,
revealed everything, and persuaded him to perform the marriage in a
legal manner; and thus, Gerald Goddard, I became your lawful wife
instead of your victim, as you supposed."

"Yes, I know it. Forsyth afterward sent me the certificate and
explained everything to me," the man admitted, with a guilty flush. "I
received the paper about a year after the report of your death."

"Ah! that could not have been very gratifying to--your other--victim,"
remarked Mrs. Stewart, with quiet sarcasm.

"Isabel! you are merciless!" cried the man, writhing under her scorn.
"But since you have learned so much, I may as well tell you
everything. Of course Anna was f