The girl's colour changed, and her breathing grew more difficult.

She was evidently dying.
'We respect the feelings which prompt you to this,' said the gentleman who had spoken first, 'but let me warn you, not to persist in what you know to be untrue, until it is too late.

It cannot save him.' 'Jack,' murmured the girl, laying her hand upon his arm, 'they shall not persuade me to swear your life away.

He didn't do it, gentlemen.

He never hurt me.' She grasped his arm tightly, and added, in a broken whisper, 'I hope God Almighty will forgive me all the wrong I have done, and the life I have led.