"Could one help it?" she whispered. "I will tell you a secret, Cyril. I believe that this is Laurel Vane herself." "But she is dead," Cyril objected, dazed by the suddenness of his wife's revelation. "I do not believe it. There has been some dreadful mistake. I believe that St. Leon Le Roy's wife lives in the person of Mrs. Lynn," exclaimed Beatrix, whispering to him earnestly for a few minutes. Laurel and Mr. Gordon, together with Mr. Ford, stood a little apart watching the gay crowd of waltzers whirling down the center of the long room to the measured beat of the gay dance music. She did not know why she turned her head and looked in another direction, but it must have been in magnetic obedience to an evil spell, for in a moment she met the glance of Maud Merivale--Maud standing near and leaning on the arm of a man who regarded her with bold and eager eyes. To have saved her life, Laurel could not have repressed that agitated start, that tremor that shook her from head to foot at sight of her old enemy's face! She had been proof against the softness of love, the allurements of friendship, but in that instant the deadly influence of fear and detestation sent a shudder through her frame and blanched her lovely face to the pallor of death. It seemed as though she was possessed by some horrible nightmare dream, as she met those bold, evil eyes, and realized he recognized her as Laurel Vane whom he had so relentlessly pursued with his evil designs. With a terrible effort she turned her eyes from the villain's exultant face, and they rested by chance on Beatrix, where she stood leaning on her husband's arm. But whose was that other form beside Beatrix--that tall and stately presence? She gave a great gasp of blended emotion--St. Leon Le Roy! CHAPTER LXII. St. Leon Le Roy--what had brought him here at this moment of all others? What strange trick did fate mean to play her in thus surrounding her all in a moment, as it were, with these people who had had so malign an influence upon her past? Her heart beat with deadly fear. One white, ringed hand furtively sought her uncle's arm and clung to it as if to save herself from falling to the floor. Through the wild rhythm of the dance music, through the measured echo of the flying feet of the waltzers, she instinctively felt him pausing before her--she heard Mrs. Wentworth's voice, saying, with a strange, sweet ring in it: "Mr. Le Roy, this is my dear friend, Mrs. Lynn." Laurel could not speak for a moment. A deadly fear possessed her. She heard a clear, calm, self-possessed voice saying, kindly: "Mrs. Lynn and I have met before. We are neighbors at our homes on the Hudson." She did not look up, but she saw his strong, shapely white hand held out to her, and as she laid her own within it, his gentle pressure seemed to say dumbly: "Do not be afraid, dear. They shall not surprise me into betraying your strange secret."