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A DREADFUL TEMPTATION. . 5
able excuse you had for taking him. My uncle, kindly be
it spoken, for he has been my kindest friend, is neither
young nor handsome. I credited you with better taste
than to love such a homely old man!”
‘You are right,” she said, writhing under the keen sting
of his words; ‘‘I did not marry him for love! Neither did
I marry him for him for money. I ‘have never craved
wealth for its own sake, though I have always known that
a costly setting would befit beauty such asmine. I sold
myself to that old man in yonder for revenge!”
‘* Revenge?” he repeated, inquiringly.
‘* Yes, upon you!” she repeated, with bitter frankness;
“‘ you sacrificed me that you might inherit your uncle’s
wealth. Love, hope, gladness, were stricken from my life
at one fell blow. There was nothing left me but revenge
upon my base deceiver. SoIsold myself for the heritage
you prized so highly that you might be left penniless.”
‘Yet once you loved me!” he muttered, half to‘himself.
‘Yes, once I loved you,” she answered, looking at him
in proud scorn. ‘‘When my aunt brought me to the city
two years ago asimple, unsophisticated country girl, you
saw me and set yourself to win me by every art of which
you were master. She encouraged you in your designs,
for she knew that you were the reputed heir of your uncle,
John St. John, and she thought it would be a fine match
for the pretty little country girl. In the spring I went
home with your ring upon my finger, the proudest girl in
the world, and told mamma that you had promised to
marry me. Then youcame down to my country home and
found out that the rich Mrs. Egerton’s pretty niece was as
poor asachurch mouse. So you went back and told John
St. John that you wanted to marry a girl who was beauti-
ful but poor, and he—the old dotard, who had forgotten
his youth, and transmuted his heart into gold—he bade
you give me up on pain of disinheritance.”
‘*And I obeyed him,” said Howard Templeton, as she
paused for breath.
‘Yes, you obeyed him,” she repeated; ‘‘ you broke your
plighted faith and word, you ruined my life, you broke my
heart, you sold your truth and your honor to that cruel old
man for his sordid gold, and now, to-night, you stand
stripped of everything—and all because you turned a
woman’s love to hate.” . S
She paused breathlessly and stood looking at him with
blazing eyes and crimson cheeks, and lips parted in a smile
of bitter triumph. | , a
She had never looked more beautiful, yet it was a dan-
gerous beauty, scathing to the man who looked upon her
|