A WARNING.
The barriers which Wiggins had raised between Edith and the outer world
had thus been surmounted by two persons--first, Mowbray, and second,
Little Dudleigh. Mowbray had come and gone without any sign of
objection or remonstrance from her jailer; and now Edith could not help
wondering at the facility with which the new-comer, Dudleigh, passed and
repassed those jealously guarded limits. Dudleigh's power arose from
some knowledge of the past history of Wiggins, but the knowledge did not
seem very definite, and she could not help wondering how long his visits
would be tolerated.
She was not left to wonder long. On the evening of the day on which
Dudleigh had made his last visit Wiggins came to see her. She had not
seen him since that time when he had brought her the so-called letter of
Miss Plympton, except once when she had caught a glimpse of him when
riding with Mowbray. He now entered in his usual manner, with his solemn
face, his formal bow, his abstracted gaze. He sat down, and for a few
moments said nothing.
“I do not often inflict my presence on you, Miss Dalton,” said he at
length. “I have too much regard for you to intrude upon you. Some day
you will understand me, and will appreciate my present course. It is
only for your own sake that I now come, because I see that you are
thoughtless and reckless, and are living under a delusion. You are
almost beyond my control, yet I still hope that I may have some faint
influence over you--or at least I can try.”
His tone was gentle and affectionate. It was, in fact, paternal in its
character; but this tone, instead of softening Edith, only seemed to her
a fresh instance of his arrogant assumption, and, as such, excited her
contempt and indignation. These feelings, however, she repressed for the
moment, and looked at him with a cold and austere face.
“You have been receiving visitors,” he continued, “visitors whom I could
have kept away if I had--chosen. But to do so would have interfered with
my plans, and so I have tolerated them. You, however, have been all
along under such a--mistake--about me--and my intentions--that you have
thrown yourself upon these strangers, and have, I grieve to say,
endangered your own future, and mine, more than you can possibly
imagine. Your first visitor was objectionable, but I tolerated him for
reasons that I need not explain; but this last visitor is one who ought
not to be tolerated either by you or by me. And now I come to you to
give you--a--an affectionate warning--to ask of you not to be so
reckless, so careless of your best interests, so blind to the great
issues that are at stake in--a--my--present plans.”
“You appear to me,” said Edith, coldly “to have some reference to
Lieutenant Dudleigh.”
“That is what he calls himself.”
“Calls himself?”
“Yes. This name Dudleigh is an assumed one. He took that so as to gain
your confidence.”
“You appear to know him very well.”
“I do not.”
“How do you know, then, that this name is assumed?”
“Because I happen to know the Dudleigh family, and this man does not
belong to it. I never saw him before.”
“There are more Dudleighs in the world than the family you speak of.”
“He is an adventurer,” said Wiggins. “You know nothing about him. I
believe his name is false, as he himself is false. Does he not pretend
to be the son of Sir Lionel?”
“No; he says that he is only a distant relation to Sir Lionel.”
“He is no relation whatever,” said Wiggins. “You are allowing yourself
to be led astray by a man of whom you know nothing--a designing villain,
an adventurer.”
“It is strange that you should apply such terms to a man of whom you
yourself acknowledge that you know nothing. But, at any rate,” continued
Edith, with strong emphasis, “_he knows you_. It is this knowledge
that gives him the power of passing through those gates which you shut
against me; what that knowledge may be you yourself know best.”
“He does not know me,” said Wiggins.
“He must,” said Edith, “for the simple reason that you dare not keep him
out.”
Wiggins looked at her in silence for some time.
“It is a terrible ordeal for me,” said he at last, in a slow, measured
tone, “to talk with you. You seem to me like one who is mad; but it is
the madness of utter ignorance. You do not know. Oh, how you tempt me
to tell you all! But I can not, I can not. My lips are sealed as yet.
But I will say no more on that. I will ask you one question only. It is
this: Can you not see with your own eyes that this man is nothing more
than a mere adventurer?”
“An adventurer!” repeated Edith, indignantly. “It ill becomes one like
you to use such a word as that. For what are you yourself? Lieutenant
Dudleigh is a gentleman; and though I have only known him for a short
time, I am happy in calling him my friend. I will tolerate no abuse of
him. Why do you not say this to his face? If he is what you say, why do
you allow him to come here? An adventurer? Why, that is the very name I
apply in all my thoughts to you!”
A look of anguish came over the face of Wiggins. He trembled violently,
but with an effort mastered his feelings. Evidently what he said was
true, and to him it was a severe ordeal to carry on a conversation with
Edith. Her scorn, her anger, and her hate all flamed forth so vehemently
that it was hard to endure.
“If you could only refrain from these bitter insults!” said he, in a
mournful voice. “If you could only put a check upon yourself when you
talk with me! I wish to speak calmly, but you hurl taunts at me that
inflict exquisite pain. The remembrance of them will one day give no
less anguish to you, believe me--oh, believe me! Spare me these taunts
and insults, I entreat you, for the sake of both of us!”
“Both of us?” repeated Edith, without being in the slightest degree
affected by the words of Wiggins. “Both of us? You seem to me to be
including yourself and me in the same class, as though there could be
any thing in common between me and one like you. That is impossible. Our
interests are forever separate.”
“You do not know,” said Wiggins, with a great effort to be calm. “This
man--this Lieutenant Dudleigh, as he calls himself--is an enemy to both
of us.”
“You use that expression with strange pertinacity. I must tell you again
that there can not possibly be any thing in common between you and me.
For my part, I consider you as my natural enemy. You are my jailer. I am
your prisoner. That is all. I am at war with you. I would give half of
my possessions to escape from your hands, and the other half to punish
you for what you have done. I live in the hope of some day meting out to
you the punishment which your crimes deserve. If any one is an enemy of
yours, that one thing is a sufficient recommendation to make him a
friend of mine.”
At these words Wiggins seemed to endure a keener anguish, and his face
bore upon it the same pallid horror which she had seen there before upon
a similar provocation. He stared at her for a few moments, and then
bowing down, he leaned his head upon his hand and looked at the floor in
silence. At last, he raised his head and looked at her with a calm face.
“Is there no possible way,” said he, “in which I can speak to you
without receiving wounds that sting like the fangs of a serpent? Be
patient with me. If I offend, try to be a little forbearing just now,
for the sake of yourself, if for nothing else. See, I am humbling
myself. I ask your forbearance. I wish to speak for your own good.
For, as it is, you are doing you know not what. You are ruining
yourself; you are blighting and blasting your own future; you are
risking your reputation; you are exposing the family name to the sneers
of the world, once again. Think of your frantic adventure at the gates
with that--that Mowbray!”
Now if Wiggins had wished to mollify Edith, or to persuade her to fall
in with his own wishes, he was certainly most unfortunate in his way of
going about it; and especially in such an allusion as this. For no
sooner did he mention the name of Mowbray than Edith was roused to a
fresh excitement.
“What!” she exclaimed. “Do _you_ throw that up to _me_--you of
all men? Who, I ask you, was the cause of all the shame and misery and
violence that I suffered there? Who was the one that made it necessary?
Who was the one that brought me to such a pitch of desperation that I
was ready to do any thing, however wild or frantic? Who? Why, you
yourself--you, who come to me now, and with a solemn voice ask me to
calm myself. Is it not possible for you to see what a horrible mockery
all this must be to me? But I will do what you ask. I will be calm in
spite of all. Come, now, I will meet you on your own ground. I will ask
you one thing. How much money will you take to let me go free?”
At this request Wiggins stared at her with the expression of one who,
while already reeling under a stroke, has received some new blow. He
started from his chair to his feet, and stood for a moment regarding her
with an indescribable look. But again he mastered his emotions, and
finally resumed his seat.
“I don't know what to say to you!” he exclaimed. “I came to advise you,
and to warn you. I have done every thing. There is one thing which would
put an end to all this misery which you inflict on me, but that one
thing I wish on no account to say just now. I can not just yet give up
the hope that has cheered me for so long a time; still, I must warn you.
Rash girl, you have already suffered from this Mowbray, as he calls
himself. Do you not see that this new visitor, this so-called Dudleigh,
is nothing else than the ally, the associate, the partner, the emissary
of Mowbray?”
“The associate of Mowbray,” said Edith, quietly, “is yourself. You sent
him to me, I have no doubt. You have your own schemes. What they are I
do not know, nor do I care to know. As for Lieutenant Dudleigh, he is, I
feel sure, an honorable gentleman, and his associates are far, very far
different from such as you and Mowbray. He is the friend of one whom I
also regard now as my only friend--one whom I never cease to pray to
reach--one whom I hope yet to find, and by his help escape from your
infamous control, and punish you for all your villainy toward me and
mine.”
“What is this? What do you mean? A friend?”
Wiggins uttered these words in a bewildered way.
“The friend whom I hope to reach,” said Edith, “the one to whom I look
for vengeance on you, is Sir Lionel Dudleigh.”
“Sir Lionel Dudleigh!” repeated Wiggins, with a groan.
“You!”
“Yes, Sir Lionel Dudleigh!” said Edith. “I see that you are agitated at
the mention of that name--the name of an honorable man--a man of
stainless name, who has nothing in common with such as you. Let me tell
you that the time will yet come when you shall have to meet Sir Lionel
Dudleigh face to face, and then you will have reason to tremble!”
At this Wiggins rose. He did not look at Edith. He did not say a word.
He seemed overwhelmed. His head was bowed down on his breast; his eyes
were fixed on the floor; and he walked with a slow and weary pace out of
the room.
“It was the threat of Sir Lionel Dudleigh,” thought Edith, “that
terrified him. He knows that the time is coming when he will have to
give an account; and he fears Sir Lionel Dudleigh more than any other
living man.”
* * * * *
[Illustration: DEAR LITTLE DUDLEIGH]