Jewel watched the bowed, golden head with a terrible hatred, a panther-like fury in her large, black eyes, and clinching her white teeth fiercely, she said to herself:
"Ah, I did not know what a hell of hate was in my heart until this weak girl came between me and my heart's beloved! I can understand now how my mother hated her mother! I can feel the same murderous jealousy that made her life wretched! Ah, what am I to do? She is alive, she is in the same city with Laurie Meredith, and they will surely find each other out despite all my lies and all my schemes."
Dark, terrible thoughts came into her mind. She wished that she could see her sister fall down dead at her feet, so bitter was her hate.
Suddenly Flower lifted her beautiful, pathetic face, and a gleam of her old spirit shone in her eyes. She exclaimed, warningly:
"Jewel, I warn you not to deceive me! If it be really Laurie Meredith, if it was not he who died, tell me the truth! What could it profit you to keep us apart now? I remember that you used to love him, that you were angry because he preferred me, but even if he had learned to love you, believing me dead, you could not be his wife now—now, while I am alive!"
A cruel, mocking laugh came from Jewel's writhing lips. She bent forward, and hissed, vindictively:
"You were always a fool, Flower! You never would listen to me when I told you that Laurie Meredith fooled you into an illegal marriage. Now, as you demand the truth, you shall have it. Laurie Meredith was a married man when he first came to our sea-side home, had a young wife in Boston when he betrayed you. She found out his treachery somehow, and that was why he left Virginia so suddenly. She was so imbittered by his wickedness that they say she did not shed a tear when he died, and in a short time she sold all her property here and went abroad, never to return."
"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.
Then Flower exclaimed: