"What is the meaning of this intrusion?" she demanded. "I told Jones that he was not to admit the likes of you to this house!" Kathleen's lightning glance almost transfixed her, and she flushed with sudden uneasiness. "I came here for my diamonds. Give them to me, and I will go," the young girl answered, defiantly, and she saw Ivan Belmont whiten to a deadly pallor. "Diamonds?" echoed Alpine, in surprise. "I have just come from Golden & Glitter's," said Kathleen. "I went there for my diamond necklace that I left there as security for a thousand dollars when I went away. They told me that Ivan Belmont had redeemed the necklace for his mother." CHAPTER XXXIX. KATHLEEN BEFORE HER FATHER'S PORTRAIT. Oh, that those lips had language! Life has passed With me but roughly since I heard thee last. Those lips are thine--thy own sweet smile I see, The same that oft in childhood solaced me. COWPER. Kathleen's declaration was almost equal to the bursting of a bomb-shell in the handsome library of the Carew mansion. Alpine sprung excitedly to her feet with a scream of surprise, and fixed her dilated blue eyes almost wildly upon Kathleen's pale, angry face. Her mother, who was so crafty and wicked that one could scarcely charge her with any meanness of which she was not guilty, had the novel sensation of being falsely accused for once, and recoiled with a nasty and indignant disclaimer from her insolent and threatening position toward the intruder. "Your accusation is entirely false!" she cried, hoarsely. But it was upon her dissipated son that Kathleen's words fell with the most crushing power. This slender, handsome Ivan Belmont, with his straw-gold curls and seraphic blue eyes, was a cold and brutal villain who utterly belied his gentle looks. He had all his mother's evil traits intensified, and would not stop at murder if there was anything to be gained by it, provided he was not to be found out. He was a coward, and afraid of punishment. So when Kathleen made her bold charge against him, and he realized that possible detection and punishment hung over his head, his coward heart gave a thump as if it would burst the confines of his narrow chest, his brain reeled, his fair face whitened to an ashy hue, his limbs trembled beneath him as he clutched the back of a chair, and with an inarticulate groan of feeble denial, he sunk in a senseless heap upon the floor. "Ivan is dead! You have killed him with your false words!" shrieked Alpine, running to her brother. Mrs. Carew followed, and they knelt down over Ivan, exclaiming and lamenting, although much of it was for effect, for they did not waste much affection on their black sheep. Kathleen, readily comprehending that Ivan had fainted from terror, curled a scornful lip, and turning her back on them, walked across the room to where a life-size portrait of her dead father filled a panel near his writing-desk.