"And yet, from the way you speak, I can't help thinking that you suspect some one."
"Oh, I! But I am only a woman. I was a very young girl then. Every one I spoke to—even Max—thought my idea a mad one, and said it would do our case far more harm than good to have it mentioned."
"Tell me, won't you, what it was?"
Madeleine hesitated. "I dare not," she answered. "My reason says that the thing is impossible. If I wrong the man, it would be shameful to create a prejudice in your mind against one, no doubt a stranger to you, but whom you might one day meet, and, meeting, remember my words. Besides, it can do no good to speak. It would be hopeless to prove anything against him, even if his hand had been in a plot."
"Yet you said that your brother had no enemy?"
"This man was my enemy. It had not always been so. Once we were friends. But—something happened, and afterward I think he hated me."
"Is it possible that you are speaking of the Marchese Loria?"
The question sprang from Virginia's lips before she had stopped to reflect whether it were wise to ask it, and she was terrified at the effect of her impulsive words.
Madeleine Dalahaide's pale, sad face became ashen, her great eyes dilated, and there was something of fear, perhaps even of distrust, in the look she turned upon Virginia.
"You know him?" she exclaimed, her voice suddenly sharp.