n and said:

"You forget Judge Trent. Do you think if I were an impostor he would
vouch for me?"

"I believe you could make any man believe what you wished him to
believe."

"Except yourself."

"Remember that a newspaper man---- However, I'll speak only for
myself." He thrust his hands into his pockets and tried to summon his
saturnine expression, but he had an uncomfortable feeling that he
looked merely wistful and boyish and that this highly accomplished
woman of the world was laughing at him. "For my own sake I want to
know," he blurted out. "I haven't an idea why I suspect you, and it is
possible that you are what you say you are. Certainly you are far too
clever not to have an alibi it would be difficult to puncture. But I
_sensed_ something that first night . . . something beyond the fact
that you were a European and did a curious thing--which, however, I
understood immediately. . . . It was something more. . . . I don't
think I can put it into words . . . you were there, and yet you were
not there . . . somebody else seemed to be looking out of your
eyes . . . even when Dinwiddie thought he had explained the
matter. . . ."

"You mean when he assumed that I was the illegitimate daughter of Mary
Zattiany. Poor Mary! She always wanted a daughter--that is, when her
own youth was over. That is the reason she was so fond of me. Do you
think I am Mary's bastard?"

"I did--I don't now. . . . I don't know what to think. . . . I have
never lost that first impression--wholly."

She stirred slightly. Was it a movement of uneasiness? He was
horribly embarrassed, but determined to hold his ground, and he kept
his eyes on her face, which retained its expression of mocking
amusement.

"But you think I am an adventuress of some sort."

"The word does not apply to you. There is no question that you are a
great lady."

"Of course I might be an actress," she said coolly. "I may have been
on the stage in Vienna when the war broke out, become accidentally
associated with Countess Zattiany, won her confidence, owing to the
extraordinary resemblance--our blood may have met and mingled in
Cro-Magnon days--stolen her papers, led her to talk of her youth--of
course every one knew Countess Zattiany's record in European
Society--forged her power of attorney with the aid of an infatuated
clerk, poisoned her--and here I am!"

He laughed. "Bully plot for the movies. That is a new angle, as they
say. I hadn