“I find that the nobler and purer a woman’s heart is, the less she credits the existence of vice and the possibility of crime among her own sex.  You doubtless consider the Brinvilliers, Fredegonds, Fulvias and Faustinas, quite as fabulous as Centaurs, Sirens and Were-wolves; and I feel as reluctant to shake your fair faith in womanhood, as to dash the dew from a rose-bud, or rudely brush the bloom a cluster of tempting grapes; but the grim truth must be told, that our old friend was robbed and murdered by a woman.”

“One of his servants?  They all seemed devotedly attached to him.”

“No, by his granddaughter, a young and very beautiful woman; Beryl Brentano, the child of General Darrington’s daughter Ellice, whom he had disowned on account of her wretched marriage with a foreigner, who taught her music and the languages.  Of course you have heard from your aunt and uncle all the details of that family episode.  Yesterday this girl Beryl suddenly presented herself at Elm Bluff, and demanded money from her grandfather; alleging that her mother’s life was in danger for want of it.  I learn there was a stormy interview, part of the conversation having been overheard by two persons; and the General, who was as vindictive as a Modoc, or a Cossack, drove the young lady through a door leading down to the rosery.  This occurred in the afternoon, immediately after I left Elm Bluff, where I went to obtain his signature to a deed to some lands recently sold in Texas.  I saw the girl sitting on the front steps, and when she rose and looked at me, her superb physique impressed me powerfully.  She is as beautiful and stately as some goddess stepping out of the Norse ‘Edda’, and altogether a remarkable looking person.  It will appear in evidence, that the General harshly refused her pleadings, and made a point of assuring her that his will, already prepared, would forever debar her mother and herself from any inheritance at his death; as he had bequeathed his entire estate to his adopted son Prince.  Unfortunately, she learned where the will was kept, as during the interview, persons in the next room distinctly heard the peculiar noise made by the sliding door of the iron vault, where General Darrington kept all his valuable papers.  She disappeared from Elm Bluff about sunset, going toward town; and last night at ten o’clock, when I left you and rode home, I saw her lurking in the pine woods not very far from the bridge over the branch, near the park gate.  She was evidently hiding, as she sat on the ground half screened by a tree; but my horse shied and plunged badly, and when she rose, the full moon showed her face and figure distinctly.  There was something so mysterious in her movements, that I asked her if she had lost her way; to which she curtly replied that she had not.  I learn from Burk, the station agent, that her actions aroused his suspicion, and that instead of leaving town, as she said she intended, by the 7:15 train, she hung about the station, and finally