CHAPTER XXV. A BITTER CONFESSION. They looked at her with astonishment. What did she have to tell? Nothing, surely. Her brain was turned by the horror of what had happened, that was all. But, with a strong effort, she controlled herself, and, looking at him with sorrowful eyes, dim with despair, she said: “You do not understand me, and you think I am insane, do you not? Alas, it is a wonder that I am not! Oh, Bayard, I am the most wretched woman! I am the victim of circumstances the most tragic that ever darkened a woman’s life.” Mrs. Howard and Bayard Lorraine began to believe that there was some method in her madness. There was an intensity of passion in her clasped hands and upraised eyes that foreboded ill. They gazed at her with new interest and attention. “Alas,” she said mournfully, “I have a bitter confession to make: and remember, Bayard, that though it may prove a deep disappointment to you, it has all the bitterness of death to me. Oh, how I have struggled to throw off this burden of fate, but it is too heavy. I am crushed beneath it, and my mother’s dying words have all come true. There is nothing but misery and despair in store for her poor child.” They made no answer to the wild ravings she uttered, because they could not understand them, and she continued despairingly: “I cannot marry you, my own, my only love, because I am not free. A terrible obstacle has arisen between us.” Mrs. Howard gave a violent start. The words of the maniac prince, as she deemed him, then came to her mind: “I am an outraged husband who has taken vengeance into his own hands. This woman is my wife!” With her passionate, loving soul quivering in her mournful voice, the girl went on: “Bayard, you must not judge me too hardly when you know all. I was so young, so ignorant, and my training had helped to lead me into that fatal error.” Suddenly he spoke, in a faint voice: “Fair, you are driving me mad. What horrible thing is it that you are going to tell me?” “It was my life, not yours, that man sought to-night,” she said. “I know that, child,” impatiently; “but why, unless he was a lunatic, did he attempt your life?” “He believed that he had bitter cause to hate me,” she answered, and the pallor of her face was for a moment superseded by a fiery blush of shame. Bayard Lorraine could only ask again, in wonder: “But why?” The crimson on her face grew deeper, and she bowed her head very low as she answered, with a sudden calmness born of great despair: