nd
upon which I have come is not a pleasant one, either for you or for me;
but I come to you strong in the right of a son to claim the heritage
which was stolen from him by an infamous mother and her more infamous
paramour----'

'I will not hear another word!' cried Lady Maulevrier, starting to her
feet, livid with passion. 'Do not dare to pronounce that name in my
hearing--the name of that abominable woman who brought disgrace and
dishonour upon my husband and his race.'

'And who brought your husband the wealth of my murdered father,'
answered the Indian, defiantly. 'Do not ignore that fact, Lady
Maulevrier. What has become of that fortune--two hundred thousand pounds
in money and jewels. It was known to have passed into Lord Maulevrier's
possession after my father was put away by his paid instruments.

'How dare you bring that vile charge against the dead?'

'There are men living in India who know the truth of that charge: men
who were at Bisnagar when my father, sick and heartbroken, was shut up
in his deserted harem, hemmed in by spies and traitors, men with murder
in their faces. There are those who know tint he was strangled by one of
those wretches, that a grave was dug for him under the marble floor of
his zenana, a grave in which his bones were found less than a year ago,
in my presence, and fitly entombed at my bidding. He was said to have
disappeared of his own free will--to have left his palace under cover of
night, and sought refuge from possible treachery in another province;
but there were those, and not a few, who knew the real history of his
disappearance--who knew, and at the time were ready to testify in any
court of justice, that he had been got rid of by the Ranee's agents, and
at Lord Maulevrier's instigation, and that his possessions in money and
jewels had been conveyed in the palankins that carried the Ranee and her
women to his lordship's summer retreat near Madras. The Ranee died at
that retreat six months after her husband's murder, not without
suspicion of poison, and the wealth which she carried with her when she
left Bisnagar passed into his lordship's possession. Had your husband
lived, Lady Maulevrier, this story must have been brought to light.
There were too many people in Madras interested in sifting the facts.
There must have been a public inquiry. It was a happy thing for you and
your race that Lord Maulevrier died before that inquiry had been
instituted, and that many animosit