“Ah, you look better now. I am afraid it quite unnerved you, hearing all about that accident to Ray,” exclaimed Leola, tenderly. “Yes, yes, it was dreadful; it made my flesh creep. Besides, I was very tired, you know, and that made it worse; but I am ever so much better now, thanks to the wine! Really, Leola, you were quite a heroine, and I cannot wonder that my artist friend fell in love with you, though I cannot, for the life of me, remember any man by that name, Ray Chester. I know I loaned your pictures to my lover, Chester Olyphant, but it cannot be that he came here to deceive a poor innocent country girl because of her pretty face--oh no! I cannot believe that of my lover. It is a good thing I came in time to thwart his evil designs, if he really is my Chester, but--ah!” She looked up, wildly, for a man’s step crunched on the ground, and the next moment he stepped into the arbor--Ray Chester, or Ray Olyphant, cool, handsome, smiling, like the villain in the play. Miss Stirling sprang to her feet with a thrilling cry. The next moment she flung herself on his broad breast, her arms about his neck, crying joyously: “Chester Olyphant, my own darling, naughty, runaway boy!” CHAPTER X. CHESTER OLYPHANT’S CURSE. Had an earthquake rent the solid ground beneath Leola’s feet she could not have been more terribly shocked. She had listened in horror, with a wildly palpitating heart, to the words that slipped from Miss Stirling’s cruel lips--listened, with the blood leaping like fire through her veins, to the suspicions suggested so coolly; but at the sudden and startling finale, when her rival sprang joyously to the breast of her lover--at this shocking finale, Leola’s blood, from coursing like liquid fire through her veins, swiftly congealed to ice, her face went white as snow, her heart stopped its wild pulsations, and she sank upon the ground, limply, like one dead. And overhead the sun shone on in the clear blue sky, and the merry robins sang among the roses as if love and life had not seemingly come to an end together for stricken Leola. But if that terrible swoon had not overtaken her at that crucial moment, Leola would have seen her lover recoil in anger from Jessie’s embrace, and push her gently but decisively away, saying, rebukingly: “Miss Stirling, pray remember that our brief engagement ended long ago, and that this advance on your part is in the worst possible taste.” If she had been conscious, instead of lying like a dead girl on the ground amid the ruins of her happiness, she would have seen Jessie Stirling sink down and clasp Chester’s knees, and with burning tears beseech him to love her again because she could not endure life without him. She would have heard these passionate prayers repulsed; she would have heard Chester Olyphant saying, coldly: