"I signed no other paper than that which contained the promise I have just spoken to you about," the girl returned earnestly, puzzled as to what he could mean.
For answer, he drew forth the note which he had taken from his mother's writing-desk and placed in his breast pocket, and put it in Jessie's hand.
"This note has been written by my mother," he said, "and this is your signature, which I would know anywhere in the world, my darling," he went on, huskily. "Oh, my love, my love! explain it to me!"
She had taken the paper from his hands, and run her eyes rapidly over the written words. They seemed to stand out in letters of fire. Her brain whirled around; her very senses seemed leaving her.
"Oh, Hubert! Hubert! listen to me!" she cried, forgetful of her surroundings, as she flung herself on her knees at his feet. "This is not the paper I signed, although the signature is so startlingly like my own that I am bewildered. I signed a paper which said that I would never cross your path again; but not this one—oh, not this one! I— I never saw this paper before. Oh, Hubert— Mr. Varrick— I plead with you not to believe that I could ever have signed a paper acknowledging that I took your mother's diamond bracelet! I have never taken anything which did not belong to me in all my life. I would have died first—starved on the street!"
Words can not describe what the thoughts were that coursed through Hubert Varrick's brain as he slowly raised her.
"Tell me, Jessie," he cried, "did you read over the paper which you signed?"
"No," she sobbed; "I did not read it. Your mother wrote it, telling me what was in it—that I was never to cross your path again, because she wished it so, and I signed it without reading it. Indeed, I could not have read a line to have saved my life, my eyes were so blinded with tears, just as they are now."
A grayish pallor spread over his face; a startling revelation had come to him: his mother had written the terrible document, every line of which she knew to be false, relying upon the girl's agitation not to discover its contents ere she signed it!
Yes, that was the solution of the mystery; he saw through the whole contemptible affair.