In five minutes she was mistress of the contents.
It was the letter Devereaux had written to acquaint Edmund Clarke with Liane's address—the fateful letter that was to betray the girl into the hands of her bitterest foe.
Ah, the hellish gleam of wicked joy in the cruel red-brown eyes; the stormy heaving of Roma's breast as she realized her great good fortune; all her enemies in her power, at her mercy! The mercy the ravenous wolf shows to the helpless lamb!
She laughed low and long in her glee, and that laughter was an awful thing to hear.
"Oh, how can I wait till to-morrow?" she muttered. "Yet I cannot go to Boston to-night, nor to-morrow, if Edmund Clarke dies to-night. Shall I spare his life till I go to Boston, and have his daughter put out of the way?"
[CHAPTER XXIII.]
A MURDEROUS FURY.