The Living Link Part 40

She pa.s.sed through, and bolted it on the inner side. She hurried up to her rooms, and on reaching them fell fainting to the floor.

CHAPTER XXIX.

THE WIFE OF LEON DUDLEIGH.

Sickness and delirium came mercifully to Edith; for if health had continued, the sanity of the body would have been purchased at the expense of that of the mind. Mrs. Dunbar nursed her most tenderly and a.s.siduously. A doctor attended her. For long weeks she lay in a brain-fever, between life and death. In the delirium that disturbed her brain, her mind wandered back to the happy days at Plympton Terrace.

Once more she played about the beautiful sh.o.r.es of Derwent.w.a.ter; once more she rambled with her school-mates under the lofty trees, or rode along through winding avenues. At time, however, her thoughts reverted to the later events of her life; and once or twice to that time of horror in the chapel.

The doctor came and went, and satisfied himself with seeing after the things that conduced to the recovery of his patient. He was from London, and had been sent for by Wiggins, who had no confidence in the local physicians. At length the disease was quelled, and after nearly two months Edith began to be conscious of her situation. She came back to sensibility with feelings of despair, and her deep agitation of soul r.e.t.a.r.ded her recovery very greatly; for her thoughts were fierce and indignant, and she occupied herself, as soon as she could think, with incessant plans for escape. At last she resolved to tell the doctor all.

One day when he came she began, but, unfortunately for her, before she had spoken a dozen words she became so excited she almost fainted.

Thereupon the doctor very properly forbade her talking about any of her affairs whatever until she was better. "Your friends," said he, "have cautioned me against this, and I have two things to regard--their wishes and your recovery." Once or twice after this Edith tried to speak about her situation, but the doctor promptly checked her. Soon after he ceased his visits.

In spite of all drawbacks, however, she gradually recovered, and at last became able to move about the room. She might even have gone out if she had wished, but she did not feel inclined.

One day, while looking over some of her books which were lying on her table, she found a newspaper folded inside one of them. She took it and opened it carelessly, wondering what might be going on in that outside world of which she had known so little for so long a time. A mark along the margin attracted her attention. It was near the marriage notices.

She looked there, and saw the following:

"On the 12th instant, at the Dalton family chapel, by the Rev. John Mann, of Dalton, Captain Leon Dudleigh, to Edith, only daughter of the late Frederick Dalton, Enquire, of Dalton Hall."

This paper was dated November 20, 1840. This was, as she knew, February 26, 1841.

The horror that pa.s.sed through her at the sight of this was only inferior to that which she had felt on the eventful evening itself.

Hitherto in all her gloom and grief she had regarded it as a mere mockery--a brutal kind of practical joke, devised out of pure malignity, and perhaps instigated or connived at by Wiggins. She had never cared to think much about it. But now, on being thus confronted with a formal notice in a public newspaper, the whole affair suddenly a.s.sumed a new character--a character which was at once terrible in itself, and menacing to her whole future. This formal notice seemed to her like the seal of the law on that most miserable affair; and she asked herself in dismay if such a ceremony could be held as binding.

She had thought much already over one thing which had been revealed on that eventful evening. The name Mowbray was an a.s.sumed one. The villain who had taken it now called himself Leon Dudleigh. Under that name he married her, and under that name his marriage was published. His friend and her betrayer--that most miserable scoundrel who had called himself Lieutenant Dudleigh--had gained her consent to this marriage for the express purpose of betraying her into the hands of her worst enemy. His name might or might not be Dudleigh, but she now saw that the true name of the other must be Dudleigh, and that Mowbray had been a.s.sumed for some other purpose. But how he came by such a name she could not tell.

She had no knowledge whatever of Sir Lionel; and whether Leon was any relation to him or not she was totally ignorant.

This gave a new and most painful turn to all her thoughts, and she began to feel anxious to know what had occurred since that evening.

Accordingly, on Mrs. Dunbar's return to her room, she began to question her. Thus far she had said but little to this woman, whom for so long a time she had regarded with suspicion and aversion. Mrs. Dunbar's long and anxious care of her, her constant watchfulness, her eager inquiries after her health--all availed nothing, since all seemed to be nothing more than the selfish anxiety of a jailer about the health of a prisoner whose life it may be his interest to guard.

"Who sent this?" asked Edith, sternly, pointing to the paper.

Mrs. Dunbar hesitated, and after one hasty glance at Edith her eyes sought the floor.

"The captain," said she at length.

"The captain?--what captain?" asked Edith.

"Captain--Dudleigh," said Mrs. Dunbar, with the same hesitation.

Edith paused. This confirmed her suspicions as to his true name. "Where is he now?" she asked at length.

"I do not know," said Mrs. Dunbar, "where he is--just now."

"Has he ever been here?" asked Edith, after another pause.

"Ever been here!" repeated Mrs. Dunbar, looking again at Edith with something like surprise. "Why, he lives here--now. I thought you knew that."

"Lives here!" exclaimed Edith.

"Yes."

Edith was silent. This was very unpleasant intelligence. Evidently this Leon Dudleigh and Wiggins were partners in this horrible matter.

"How does he happen to live here?" she asked at length, anxious to discover, if possible, his purpose.

Mrs. Dunbar again hesitated. Edith had to repeat her question, and even then her answer was given with evident reluctance.

"He says that you--I mean that he--is your--that is, that he is--is master," said Mrs. Dunbar, in a hesitating and confused way.

"Master!" repeated Edith.

"He says that he is your--your--" Mrs. Dunbar hesitated and looked anxiously at Edith.

"Well, what does he say?" asked Edith, impatiently. "He says that he is my--what?"

"Your--your husband," said Mrs. Dunbar, with a great effort.

At this Edith stared at her for a moment, and then covered her face with her hands, while a shudder pa.s.sed through her. This plain statement of the case from one of her jailers made her situation seem worse than ever.

"He came here," continued Mrs. Dunbar, in a low tone, "the day after your illness. He brought his horse and dog, and some--things."

Edith looked up with a face of agony.

"He said," continued Mrs. Dunbar, "that you were--married--to--him; that you were now his--his wife, and that he intended to live at the Hall."

"Is that other one here too?" asked Edith, after a long silence.

"What other one?"

"The smaller villain--the one that used to call himself Lieutenant Dudleigh."

Mrs. Dunbar shook her head.

"Do you know the real name of that person?"

"No."

Edith now said nothing for a long time; and as she sat there, buried in her own miserable thoughts, Mrs. Dunbar looked at her with a face full of sad and earnest sympathy--a face which had a certain longing, wistful expression, as though she yearned over this stricken heart, and longed to offer some consolation. But Edith, even if she had been willing to receive any expressions of sympathy from one like Mrs. Dunbar, whom she regarded as a miserable tool of her oppressor, or a base ally, was too far down in the depths of her own profound affliction to be capable of consolation. Bad enough it was already, when she had to look back over so long a course of deceit and betrayal at the hands of one whom she had regarded as her best friend; but now to find that all this treachery had culminated in a horror like this, that she was claimed and proclaimed by an outrageous villain as his wife--this was beyond all endurance. The blackness of that perfidy, and the terror of her memories, which till now had wrung her heart, fled away, and gave place to the most pa.s.sionate indignation.

And now, at the impulse of these more fervid feelings, her whole outraged nature underwent a change. Till now she had felt most strongly the emotions of grief and melancholy; now, however, these pa.s.sed away, and were succeeded by an intensity of hate, a vehemence of wrath, and a hot glow of indignant pa.s.sion that swept away all other feelings. All the pride of her haughty spirit was roused; her soul became instinct with a desperate resolve; and mingling with these feelings there was a scorn for her enemies as beings of a baser nature, and a stubborn determination to fight them all till the bitter end.

All this change was manifest in her look and tone as she again addressed Mrs. Dunbar.