And so Serena laid her plot, and went to work with a will. She must have money, for her funds were nearly exhausted, and her mother was not much better off. Real poverty stared them in the face. And here, right before her, was the possibility of retrieving her fallen fortunes and securing a grand home for herself and her mother.
And better than all else—to a narrow nature like hers—it would be opening a road to the ruin of Keith Kenyon, and to wreak upon him a dire and speedy vengeance. He would not love her; he would not make her his wife; he had discarded her for the pretty face of another woman; had cast her off coldly. Well, she would marry old Bernard Dane and possess the great Dane fortune. Then Mr. Keith Kenyon might look out for himself. To a nature like Serena Lynne's, this was a glorious triumph.
She little dreamed how, in the dark days to come, she would bitterly regret having ever made this decision.
[CHAPTER XXIV.]
AN UNEXPECTED DECLARATION.
In a white bed in a darkened room at the institution to which Sister Angela belonged, poor Beatrix lay moaning and tossing in pain. For she was stricken down with brain fever, and there seemed to be small hope of her recovery.
She had not told Sister Angela her name, therefore no one at the institution was able to identify her; and although the physician in charge of Beatrix saw the advertisement which Keith had inserted in the newspapers, how could he guess that the Beatrix who was implored to return to K was the very patient in whom the physician was becoming strangely interested? All that he did know concerning her history was what Sister Angela had repeated to him; and of course the information was meager enough; for in her misery poor Beatrix had not felt inclined to confide absolutely. But the physician saw for himself how beautiful the girl was, and that she was a refined and delicate lady, and his interest grew and flourished.
Sister Angela confided in Doctor Darrow the outlines of the girl's case as far as she herself knew, that is, in regard to her strange inheritance. Doctor Darrow's face grew pale as death, and his gray eyes dilated with horror until they were as dark as night.