"Leave that to me; I will be responsible for the result."

Thus was a net woven for an unsuspecting victim. Who was she, and what the
cause for this unrelenting and revengeful feeling on the part of Durant?
Time must show.




CHAPTER II.

A VILLAIN UNMASKED.


In a beautiful district of the "Old Dominion," bordering on the
Rappahannock, there lived, just previous to the time of the opening of our
story, a planter, who had once been wealthy, but whose princely fortune had
become much reduced by indiscriminate kindness. Possessed of a noble heart,
a generous disposition, and the finest sympathies, he could never find it
in his heart to say "no" to an application for assistance. Thousands had
thus gone to pay debts of security; and, at last, he resolved to move to
the West, as a means of retrieving his affairs, as well as to cut loose
from the associations which were rapidly diminishing the remains of his
wealth.

This planter, whom we shall call General Walton, (the last name assumed,
the title one given him by common consent,) had one son, and an only
daughter, the former twenty-one, the latter eighteen, at the time we wish
to introduce them to the reader's notice. Both were worthy, the one as a
man, the other as a woman. He was noble, intellectual, manly; she was