“Yes, explain, if you can, for your conduct certainly appears very suspicious,” Jessie Stirling answered, with a bitter, taunting laugh that nearly drove him wild.
And yet, in all his anger, he knew she was right; it did look bad, this masquerade; and, although he despised the girl, he knew he must explain for Leola’s sake.
Still unconscious that his bonny sweetheart lay upon the ground, so close that if he stepped backward he must stumble over her senseless form, he glanced out of the arbor to see if she were coming, and then turned back to Jessie, saying, hoarsely:
“It looks suspicious, I grant you, but when a man is cursed with immense wealth, and knows himself constantly the prey of designing women wanting to marry him for his money, is it not excusable that, by a little harmless deception, he may win a girl’s heart by love alone, and thus ensure his future happiness?”
“Bah! a slim excuse!” she sneered; but, restraining his resentment, he continued, earnestly:
“This, I swear to you, Miss Stirling, was my only reason for the little deception I practised on Leola, and my plan succeeded well. I have won for my own the sweetest, truest heart that ever beat, and I had decided last night to come here to-day to confess all to Leola and her guardian, and to press for an immediate marriage, in order to save her from the persecutions of a rich old man, who has Mr. Hermann in his power, by reason of a mortgage on his property. It was my design to relieve his embarrassment by advancing the amount myself to pay off the mortgage. I hope you will accept this truthful explanation, and forego the gratification of your unwise spite by any persecution of my dear little love, Leola, whom I must now seek.”
“You will not have far to seek. Look behind you on the ground!” Miss Stirling answered, with a bitter laugh.
Then for the first time he became aware of Leola’s presence—Leola lying like a dead girl on the ground at his feet.
In the one moment that he stood gazing down like a statue of despair, Miss Stirling cried, with triumphant malice:
“Just before you came in Leola and I had had a very satisfactory explanation, for I recognized you in her description, and I soon made her understand your villainy. Yes, I told her you were betrothed to me, and that you were deceiving her. She believed me, and despised you, and just at the moment of her outcry against you, when you entered and I sprang to your breast, claiming you for my own, she dropped like one with a bullet in her heart, and there she has been lying ever since, and more than likely the poor, deceived girl is really dead of the shock.”