hair, and white arms bare to the shoulder, seemed to
attract all the light; her face was changed from its great
agitation--the calm, fair beauty, the gentle, caressing manner were
gone.

Near her stood Pauline, whose countenance was softened with compassion
and pity unutterable, the dark eyes shining as through a mist of tears.

Before them, as a criminal before his judges, stood Aubrey Langton, with
an angry scowl on his handsome face, and yet something like fear in his
eyes.

"What is it?" he cried, impatiently. "I cannot understand this at all."

Lady Darrell turned her pale face to him.

"Captain Langton," she said, gravely, "Miss Darrell brings a terrible
accusation against you. She tells me that you stole the roll of notes
that Sir Oswald missed, and that at the price of her life you extorted
an oath from her not to betray you; is it true?"

She looked at him bravely, fearlessly.

"It is a lie!" he said.

Lady Darrell continued:

"Here, in this room, where we are standing now, she tells me that the
scene took place, and that, finding she had discovered you in the very
act of theft, you held a loaded pistol to her head until she took the
oath you dictated. Is it true or false?"

"It is a lie!" he repeated; but his lips were growing white, and great
drops stood upon his brow.

"She tells me," resumed Lady Darrell, "that you loved her, and that you
care only for Darrell Court, not for me. Is it true?"

"It is all false," he said, hoarsely--"false from beginning to end! She
hates you, she hates me, and this foul slander has only been invented to
part us!"

Lady Darrell looked from one to the other.

"Now Heaven help me!" she cried. "Which am I to believe?"

Grave and composed, with a certain majesty of truth that could never be
mistaken, Pauline raised her right hand.

"Lady Darrell," she said, "I swear to you, in the presence of Heaven,
that I have spoken nothing but the truth."

"And I swear it is false!" cried Aubrey Langton.

But appearances were against him; Lady Darrell saw that he trembled,
that his lips worked almost convulsively, and that great drops stood
upon his brow.

Pauline looked at him; those dark eyes that had in them no shadow save
of infinite pity and sorrow seemed to penetrate his soul, and he shrank
from the glance.

"Elinor," he cried, "you believe me, surely? Miss Darrell has always
hated you, and this is her revenge."

"Lady Darrell," said the girl, "I am ashamed of