"Running away! Flower running away! But why? What reason--" Spite of Flower's frantic struggles Jewel tore the shrouding cloak from her sister's form. "Reason! ha, ha! Look at her one moment and you will see her reason!" she laughed, in bitter triumph; and Mrs. Fielding, after one wild, searching glance, threw up her thin white hands and uttered a shriek of horror and anger combined. Jewel sprung quickly to her mother's side. "Do not take it so hard, mamma," she cried, eagerly, with blazing eyes. "Her disgrace can not touch you nor me! Oh, mamma, I have fathomed the secret that has tortured you so long! This is the girl that was foisted on you by your faithless husband in place of my dead twin sister! This Flower is Daisy Forrest's daughter!" CHAPTER XIII. It was a tragic moment in the lives of the three who stood in that closed room looking into one another's faces with dilated eyes. Flower had fallen on her knees and dropped her shamed face in her hands when Jewel tore away her cloak. But at those startling words, uttered so triumphantly by her twin sister, the little white hands fell helplessly at her sides, and the blue eyes stared in bewilderment at her mother. Did she hear aright? Was she dreaming, or was that Jewel, her twin sister, plucking eagerly at her mother's sleeve and saying such strange things in that hard, triumphant voice. "Don't take it so hard, mamma. Her disgrace can not touch you nor me. Ah, mamma, I have fathomed the secret that has tortured you so long. This is the girl that was foisted on you by your faithless husband in place of my dead twin sister. This is Daisy Forrest's daughter." The room seemed to reel, the solid walls to go up and down in some strange fashion before Flower's dim eyes, but she tried to keep her senses and hear what her mother would say to this monstrous charge. She saw the dark-eyed, white-haired woman reel backward and throw up her arms into the air, while a strange, unearthly cry burst from her lips--a cry that was half-fierce joy and half a strangling horror. Jewel laughed triumphantly, and continued: "I was determined to find out Maria's secret--the terrible secret that had changed you so, but you would not satisfy my curiosity. So I watched and waited, and at last I heard you talking to Sam about some papers that he had hidden from you. I have been seeking them ever since, and to-day I found them, read them, and so became acquainted with all my father's villainy, and the share taken in it by our old nurse." Mrs. Fielding's eyes began to blaze with a wild, maniacal light. She held out her hands with a commanding gesture. "The papers! Give them to me!" she cried, hoarsely. Jewel shook her head.