"No, no; I will not believe he could be so wicked," came in a whisper of agony from Flower's white lips. "Oh, Jewel, how did you learn all this?"
"From my betrothed, the cousin of your heartless betrayer," Jewel replied, coolly; and a short silence fell between the two.
"Jewel, I should like to see this man! I should like to hear from his own lips--"
"You are mad!" she cried. "Do you think I would permit it, that I would own you, the half-sister whose kinship to me is her disgrace and a brand on the memory of my dead father?"
She turned her back on the poor girl with a disdainful gesture, and swept toward the fire, and stood there with her pretty pointed slipper on the fender, murderous thoughts rising in her heart.
"I could kill her, I hate and fear her so much!" she thought, hotly.
Flower's tear-wet eyes had fallen to the floor. They fastened on an envelope lying close to her feet half under the folds of her dress. She saw the name of her sister on the upper side.
She did not feel much interest in the letter. She could not understand afterward, when she came to think of it soberly, why she had picked it up and hid it in her breast.
Jewel moved from her position in front of the fire, and trailed the beautiful folds of her purple velvet dress across the floor to the window.
She drew back a fold of the lace curtain and peered through the window-pane and the closed shutters into the street.
The short, wintery afternoon was darkening into twilight, and the sky was obscured by dark, heavy clouds. The proud, imperious beauty leaned her brow against the cold pane, trying to solve the problem that tormented her mind.
"I must get rid of her somehow. She dimly suspects treachery on my part. If she goes out of the house again she will prosecute her search and learn all," she thought. "Ah, I have a plan! If I could only detain her here long enough to have that doctor come and take her to the _maison de santé_ where mamma is, she would never get out again!"
She turned swiftly, crossed the room to Flower, and sat down by her side on the sofa, placing her white arm around her sister's neck.
"My poor little sister, forgive me my harshness," she whispered, penitently.
The drooping, despondent girl started and looked up. That Judas face was wreathed in a loving smile that bewildered her. Never had she caught such a look on her half-sister's face since their early happy days ere Laurie Meredith's love had come between their hearts.