"Jaqueline Ardelle."
The man started—a groan of agony forced itself between his bloodless, pain-drawn lips.
"For God's sake, I ask you, for God's sake, tell me all you know of your mother," he exclaimed, in low, tense accents, while his black eyes seemed to burn with inward fire.
"I know very little to tell you," she said, with increasing wonder at his fearful agitation, for great drops of dew beaded his high, white brow. "I have told you her name was Jaqueline Ardelle. My father married her in the south of France. He was an artist, and fell in love with her beauty. He brought her home with him, and when I was born she died."
"And this was her hair—her ring—her locket?" he said, as she paused, and then Jaquelina saw for the first time that he had taken her mother's ring from her finger. She reached out her hand for it as she said, sadly:
"Yes, that was her ring and her locket, and that was a curl they cut off for papa after she was dead. And this dress I have on now was my mother's wedding-dress."
There was a pause. The dark eyes of the outlaw were fixed on the curl in his hand. Its silken tendrils seemed to twine about his hand caressingly.
"Give me the curl. I will put it back in the locket," said the girl, rising abruptly to a sitting posture.
"No—no," the outlaw murmured, dreamily, like one talking in his sleep.
"Give it to me," Jaquelina repeated, half angrily. "It is mine—mine."