ou need not fear to confess it now. You did abhor me, you
know."

"On my honor, I do not know what you are talking about, my own
darling. I never wrote about you except with respect; and that, too,
in spite of those awful, cutting, sneering letters which you wrote
for years, and that last one, written after my father's death."

"Heavens! what do you mean?" cried Zillah, aghast. "I sent letters to
you regularly, but I never wrote any thing but affectionate words."

"Affectionate words! I never received a letter that was not a sneer
or an insult. I came home under an assumed name, thinking that I
would visit Chetwynde unknown, to see what sort of a person this was
who had treated me so. I changed my intention, however, and went
there in my own name. I found that woman there--an impostor. How was
I to know that? But I hated her from the outset."

"Ah," said Zillah, "you were then full of memories of Inez Cameron."

This thought had suddenly stung her, and, forgetting the Windham of
Marseilles, she flung it out.

"Of what? Inez? What is that?" asked Lord Chetwynde, in a puzzle.

"Inez Cameron."

"Inez Cameron! Who is Inez Cameron?"

"Inez Cameron," said Zillah, wondering--"that fair companion of so
many evenings, about whom you wrote in such impassioned
language--whose image you said was ever in your heart."

"In the name of Heaven," cried Lord Chetwynde, "what is it that you
mean? Who is she?"

"Captain Cameron's sister," said Zillah.

"Captain Cameron's sister?"

"Yes."

"Captain Cameron has no sister. I never saw any one named Inez
Cameron. I never mentioned such a name in any letter, and I never had
any image in my heart except yours, my darling."

"Why, what does it all mean?"

"It means this," said Lord Chetwynde, "that we have for years been
the victims of some dark plot, whose depths we have not yet even
imagined, and whose subtle workings we have not yet begun to trace.
Here we are, my darling, asking questions of one another whose
meaning we can not imagine, and making charges which neither of us
understand. You speak of some letter which I wrote containing
statements that I never thought of. You mention some Inez Cameron, a
lady whom I never heard of before. You say also that you never wrote
those letters which imbittered my life so much."

"Never, never. I never wrote any thing but kindness."

"Then who wrote them?"

"Oh!" cried Zillah, suddenly, as a light burst on her; "I see it all!