jubilation. She was a beautiful
creature, full of the poetry and fire and passion of the South; and
the few English words which she had learned were spoken in such a
sweet and pretty broken way that she won the hearts of the people
almost as much by the music of her voice as by the melting beauty of
her dark eyes.

Geoffrey Brent seemed more happy than he had ever before appeared; but
there was a dark, anxious look on his face that was new to those who
knew him of old, and he started at times as though at some noise that
was unheard by others.

And so months passed and the whisper grew that at last Brent's Rock
was to have an heir. Geoffrey was very tender to his wife, and the new
bond between them seemed to soften him. He took more interest in his
tenants and their needs than he had ever done; and works of charity on
his part as well as on his sweet young wife's were not lacking. He
seemed to have set all his hopes on the child that was coming, and as
he looked deeper into the future the dark shadow that had come over
his face seemed to die gradually away.

All the time Wykham Delandre nursed his revenge. Deep in his heart had
grown up a purpose of vengeance which only waited an opportunity to
crystallise and take a definite shape. His vague idea was somehow
centred in the wife of Brent, for he knew that he could strike him
best through those he loved, and the coming time seemed to hold in its
womb the opportunity for which he longed. One night he sat alone in
the living-room of his house. It had once been a handsome room in its
way, but time and neglect had done their work and it was now little
better than a ruin, without dignity or picturesqueness of any kind. He
had been drinking heavily for some time and was more than half
stupefied. He thought he heard a noise as of someone at the door and
looked up. Then he called half savagely to come in; but there was no
response. With a muttered blasphemy he renewed his potations.
Presently he forgot all around him, sank into a daze, but suddenly
awoke to see standing before him someone or something like a battered,
ghostly edition of his sister. For a few moments there came upon him a
sort of fear. The woman before him, with distorted features and
burning eyes seemed hardly human, and the only thing that seemed a
reality of his sister, as she had been, was her wealth of golden hair,
and this was now streaked with grey. She eyed her brother with a long,
cold stare; and he