"Ah! that dear girl," sighed Fanny. "Have you learned anything further about her, Mr. Shelton?"
He shook his head sadly.
"I am sorry to say I have not. The wretches have eluded me in some way, and managed to remove her without my knowledge. But I do not despair of catching up with them yet, and restoring the unfortunate young creature to her friends."
"God grant you may," she murmured, fervently.
"There is one thing I wish to ask you," said he, suddenly. "When you were telling me your story that day in the dungeon, you made an assertion that threw a new light on the subject of Miss Lawrence's supposed death."
"Ah! what was that?" she inquired.
"You know, or, perhaps, you do not know," said he, "that the jury's verdict was suicide. Yet you made the assertion that she was murdered by a jealous woman."
"Miss Lawrence was my informant, sir," answered Mrs. Colville. "Perhaps she knew all the circumstances better than the jury."
"No doubt she did," he answered, smiling at her demure tone. "And the woman?"
"Was a beautiful widow who lives under the Lawrence roof, and is dependent on the banker for the very means of existence. I cannot recall her name, for I have a peculiar faculty for forgetting names, but perhaps you have heard it."