"Have you any special commands for me to attend to during your absence?"
"None, save that you are to remain here as usual, if you like, and in case any word comes from my loved ones, send for me at once."
"Very well. Have you any idea how long you will be away?"
"No. I may not be gone a month; I may stay ten years; it will depend upon how well I can kill time," returned Sir William, moodily.
"Oh, William, I wish you would try and rise above this trouble," said his sister, out of all patience with him at heart, but speaking in a soothing tone. "I do not like to pain you, but, truly, it looks to me as if your wife had been guilty of willful desertion in thus hiding herself from you, and I believe there would be a great deal of happiness yet for you if you could be freed from her entirely, and then bring some good, gentle woman here to make your home pleasant for you."
It was the first time that she had ever been able to gather courage sufficient to make this proposition; but she was wholly unprepared for the storm of wrath which the suggestion brought upon her head.
Sir William came and stood, tall and stern, before her, his face almost convulsed with mingled pain and wrath, his eyes blazing dangerously:
"Miriam Linton," he began, in a suppressed tone, "never dare to open your lips on such a subject to me again. I married my darling for better or worse, until death should part us, and only my death or hers will ever break the tie--at least with my consent--that binds us."
He turned abruptly and left the room as he ceased speaking, more angry with her than he had ever been before.
Lady Linton was thoroughly startled by what he had said, and she knew she would never dare suggest such a measure again to him; but she still had a secret hope, from what Mrs. Farnum had written her, that the injured wife would seek a legal separation from him.
She imagined that this might be the reason of Virgie keeping so quiet just at present, and she was all the more willing and glad to have her brother go away from home, as he proposed doing, because she knew that he would have to be notified whenever any such proceedings should be inst.i.tuted, and she feared if he were there to receive them he would at once post off to America again, and upset all her plans by bringing about a reconcilation at the last moment.
So in less than a week Sir William left England for, Egypt and the Holy Land, and Lady Linton experienced a feeling of intense relief at his departure. Time, she reasoned, was a great healer, and she hoped much from this season of travel and change.
It was rather lonely for her at Heathdale during the winter, but she was grateful to be released from the anxiety she had suffered on his account for the last year.
Spring came, summer pa.s.sed; a year had come and gone since the disappearance of her brother"s young wife, when one day there came an official-looking doc.u.ment addressed to the baronet, and bearing the California postmark.
Lady Linton quivered in every nerve as she saw it, for her heart told her instantly what it contained.
Still, she could not be satisfied until she knew beyond a doubt, and she skillfully opened it for examination before forwarding it to her brother.
It was even as she had hoped.
Virgie had kept her word; she was about to repudiate her husband for his supposed faithlessness to her, and Lady Linton"s lips curled in a smile of exultation as she read the paper notifying her brother that proceedings for a divorce were about to be inst.i.tuted in the courts of San Francis...o...b.. Lady Virginia Heath against Sir William Heath, of Heathsdale, England.
"Everything is working beautifully," she murmured, triumphantly; "his pride will never let him seek her after this takes effect; it will be conclusive evidence to him that she, at least, desires to have the tie that binds them broken. Let me see! he is notified to appear on the ninth of next month--in a little more than four weeks. Ha, ha! he was in Alexandria when he last wrote, and this could not possibly reach him in season to admit of his obeying the summons in time. Matters will have reached a crisis before he gets it--the injured and beautiful little savage will have secured her divorce, and my brother will be free, long before he will know what has been done. However, I will do my duty, and forward it to him instantly."
With a lighter heart than she had known for months, the crafty woman carefully resealed the doc.u.ment in a way to defy suspicion that it had been tampered with, inclosed it in another envelope, directed and marked it "important," and dispatched it by the very next mail to her brother.
Three months pa.s.sed and she had heard nothing from him. She began to feel anxious as to how he had received the news of what Virgie was doing, when there came another similar-looking doc.u.ment, bearing the same postmark as before.
"The deed is done!" she cried, joyfully, the moment her eyes rested upon it. "I do not even need to open this to be a.s.sured of the nature of its contents."
She was filled with triumph over the success of all her plans thus far, and yet she could not forget Virgie"s threat that a day of retribution would surely overtake their proud family.
But she determined not to worry, for the child might not live long enough for her to carry her threat into execution. Virgie, herself, might die, and a hundred other things might happen to prevent.
Her brother might never consent to marry again--she feared he would not--and poor Sadie Farnum"s reviving hopes would again be crushed; but, if he did, she felt very sure that her son, Percy--and a n.o.ble young fellow he was, too--would be very likely to inherit Heathdale, while Lillian would doubtless receive a handsome dowry when she came to marry.
"I do not believe I will send this to William," she muttered, as she turned that precious doc.u.ment over and over in her hands, and feasted her eyes upon it. "I will at least wait until I hear something from him regarding the other; these priceless papers might be lost on the way, and then----"
Her musings were suddenly cut short by a violent ring at the hall bell.
She started, and sat erect to listen, her face growing pale and anxious, for there seemed to be something ominous in that vigorous jangle which went echoing through the house with such an imperious sound.
The night was raw and stormy; darkness had settled down over the country earlier than usual; there had been a disagreeable chill in the air all day, and a dismal sense of loneliness pervaded the mansion.
She heard the butler go to the door; then there was a sudden exclamation of surprise, followed by a few indistinct sentences, a step, strangely familiar, outside the library door, and the next moment Sir William, gaunt, haggard, and wretched, staggered into the room where his sister was sitting.
Chapter XXII.
Virgie Makes a Home for Herself.
"William," cried Lady Linton, springing excitedly to her feet, the doc.u.ment which had caused her so much joy but a moment before dropping unheeded on the table beside her. "What brings you home in this unceremonious manner? Are you ill? Has anything happened?"
"Am I ill? Yes, by heart is broken--dying within me. Has anything happened? My wife is lost to me forever!" he cried, in a hollow tone, as he sank weakly into a chair and groaned aloud.
"What can I do for you? Let me call John to remove your boots and bring you dry clothing," his sister said, thoroughly alarmed by his appearance; and suiting the action to her words, she rang for the butler.
John came, and attended to his master"s wants with alacrity. Wood was piled upon the already cheerful fire, something hot was provided the traveler to drink, and Lady Linton soon had the satisfaction of seeing something like warmth and life stealing into her brother"s haggard face.
She understood at once that he must have been nearly crushed upon receiving the doc.u.ment which she had sent him, and that he had immediately started for home. He must have been taken ill on the way and been detained else he would have been there before, and she could imagine how he would chafe over the delay, and how heart-sick he had grown over the fact of being too late to stay the proceedings for the divorce.
She dreaded to have him know that the die was irrevocably cast, although his own words had told her that he apprehended it; but she absolutely feared the first pa.s.sionate outbreak when she should give him those other papers that had but just arrived.
When he began to grow more calm, and to realize the comfort of being once more before his own hearthstone Lady Linton stole softly away to confer with the housekeeper about preparing him something specially tempting for his supper.
She was absent perhaps fifteen minutes, and was about to return to him, when she was startled by a heavy fall on the floor above her.
Her heart told her what had caused it, and she hurried up stairs with all the speed that fear could lend to her feet, and burst into the library, to find her brother stretched lifeless upon the floor, an open paper clutched tightly in his hand, while John, the faithful butler, was bending over him in an agony of terror.
"Send for Sir Herbert Randal at once, then come back to me," commanded her ladyship, as she stooped to lift her brother"s head to place a cushion under it and loosen his necktie.
John sped to do her bidding, and during his absence Lady Linton succeeded in removing that tell-tale doc.u.ment from Sir William"s hand, and locking it away from all inquisitive eyes; for her first thought was that there must be no scandal over the affair.
Few knew of his marriage. She had persisted in keeping still about it, in spite of all his orders to the contrary, and after his return from his fruitless search for Virgie, he had been far too sensitive upon the subject to talk of it himself, and thus almost everybody believed him to be still a single man. Hence Lady Linton"s anxiety that nothing should be known regarding the divorce.
When John returned to her she summoned other servants and had Sir William carried to his own rooms, where she and the housekeeper applied all remedies that were at hand to revive him.
When the physician arrived he had recovered from his swoon, but was in a raging fever, and wild with delirium.
Sir Herbert p.r.o.nounced his illness to be brain fever of a serious type, and Lady Linton knew, from the grave look on the wise man"s face, that he had but very little hope of his recovery.