It was all the answer that Edith, in her excitement, could make.
The beautiful woman caught her breath graspingly, and every particle of color faded from her face.
"Tell me, also," she went on, hurriedly, "did you ever hear your—your mother speak of a friend by the name of Belle Haven?"
Edith's heart leaped into her throat at this question, and she, too, began to tremble, as a suspicion of the truth flashed through her mind.
"No," she said, with quivering lips, "I never heard her mention such a person; but—"
"Yes—'but'—" eagerly repeated her companion.
"But," the fair girl continued, gravely, while she searched with a look of pain the eyes looking so eagerly into hers, "the evening after mamma was buried, I found some letters which had been written to her from Rome, and which were all signed 'Belle.'"
"Oh!—"
It was a sharp cry of agony that burst from Isabel Stewart's lips.
"Oh, why did she keep them?" she went on, wildly; "how could she have been so unwise? Why—why did she not destroy them?"