ntly interposed Mona. "As I said before, my
uncle assured me of the fact, but your admission is worth something to me
as corroborative evidence. All that I desire now is tangible proof of it;
if you can and will obtain that for me, I shall have some faith in your
assertion that you wish to help me."

"Are you so eager to claim, as your father, the man who deserted your
mother?" Louis Hamblin asked, with a sneer, and wishing to sound her a
little further.

"No; I simply want proof that my mother was a legal wife--I have only
scorn and contempt for the man who wronged her," Mona replied, intense
aversion vibrating in her tones. "I regard him, as my uncle did, as a
knave--a brute."

"Did Walter Dinsmore represent him as such to you?" inquired her
companion, in a mocking tone.

"He did; he expressed the utmost contempt and loathing for the man who
had ruined his sister's life."

The young man gave vent to a short, derisive laugh.

"I cannot deny the justness of the epithets applied to him," he said,
with a sneer, "but, that such terms should have fallen from the
immaculate lips of the cultured and aristocratic Walter Dinsmore, rather
amuses me, especially as the present Mrs. Dinsmore might, with some
reason, perhaps, bring the same charges against him."

"Did you know my uncle?" Mona questioned, with some surprise.

"Not personally; but Mrs. Montague knew him very well years ago."

"Oh! I wonder if you could tell me--" Mona began, greatly agitated, as
she recalled the dreadful suspicion that had flashed into her mind
regarding her uncle, in connection with her father's death.

"If I could tell you what?" Louis inquired, while he wondered what
thought could have so suddenly blanched her face, and sent that look of
terror into her beautiful eyes.

"Oh, I want to know--did he--how did my father die?" the young girl
cried, in faltering, trembling tones.

Louis Hamblin regarded her with unfeigned astonishment at the question.

"How did your father die?" he repeated. "Why, like any other respectable
gentleman--in his own house, and of an incurable disease."

"Oh! then he did die a natural death," breathed Mona, with a sigh of
relief that was almost a sob.

"Certainly. Ah!" and her companion appeared suddenly to divine her
thoughts, "so you imagined that Walter Dinsmore killed Richmond Montague
for the wrong done your mother! Ha! ha! I have no doubt that he felt
bitter enough to commit murder, or almost any other