She was too much engrossed by her mournful retrospective task, to observe the deadly pallor that overspread Regina’s face, as the girl rested her head on the arm of the sofa and passed her fingers across her eyes, striving to veil the image of one beyond the broad Atlantic’s sweep and roar.

“At last I began to taste the sweet poison of my revenge.  Cuthbert did not suspect my identity, but he was strangely fascinated by my face and acting.  Openly indifferent to the woman with whom his father had linked him, and provided with no conscientious scruples, he audaciously expressed his admiration, and contrived an interview to commence his advances.  He avowed sentiments disloyal to the heiress who wore his name and jewels, and insulting to me had I been what he supposed me, merely Odille Orme a pretty actress.  I repulsed and derided him, forbidding him my presence; and none can appreciate the exquisite delight it afforded me to humiliate and torture him.  When it was a crime in the sight of man, he really began to love the woman, who—­in God’s sight—­was his own lawful wife; and his punishment was slowly approaching.

“My health gave way under the unnatural pressure of acting evening after evening, with his handsome magnetic face watching every feature, every inflection of my voice.  I was ordered to rest in Italy, and when I learned I should there meet General Laurance, I consented to go.  Before leaving Paris, I saw the only child of that hideous iniquitous sham marriage; and, darling, when I contrasted you, my own pure pearl, with the deformed, dwarfish, repulsive daughter, whom the Nemesis of my wrongs gave to Cuthbert, in little Maud Laurance, I almost shouted aloud in my great exultation.  You so beautiful, with his own lineaments in every feature, disowned for that misshapen, imbecile heiress of his proud name.  Oh, mills of the Gods! how delicious the slow music of their grinding!

“Thus far, my daughter, I have shown you all your mother’s wretched past, and now I shrink from the last blotted pages.  Hitherto my record was blameless, but even now take care how you judge the mother, who if she has gone astray did it for you, all for you.  For some time I had known that Cuthbert was living in reckless extravagance, that the affairs of the father-in-law were dangerously involved, and that without his own father’s knowledge Cuthbert had borrowed large sums in London and Paris, securing the loans by mortgages on his real estate in America; especially the elegant homestead, preserved for several generations in his family.  Employing two shrewd Hebrew brokers, I by degrees bought up those mortgages, straining every effort to effect the purchase.

“When I reached Milan, I sat one night pondering what was most expedient.  It was apparent that in a suit for and publication of my real title and rights, I should be defeated by the disgrace hurled upon me; and to subject the Laurances to the humiliation of a court scandal would poorly indemnify me for the horrible stain which Peterson’s foul claim would entail upon your innocent but premature birth.  My health was feeble, consumption threatened my lungs, and Mr. Palma urged me to attempt no legal redress for my injuries.  I could not die without one more struggle to see you lighted, clothed with your lawful name.