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
assiduously. 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 shores of Derwentwater; 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
retarded 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 passed 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 assumed 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 assumed 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 assumed 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 passed 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
passionate 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 passed away,
and were succeeded by an intensity of hate, a vehemence of wrath, and a
hot glow of indignant passion 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.
“You have all mistaken me,” said she, with bitter hostility; “you have
imagined that you had to deal with some silly child. But this shall do
none of you any good. You may kill me among you, but I am not afraid to
die. Death itself will be welcome rather than submission to that foul
miscreant, that vulgar coward, who takes advantage of a contemptible
trick, and pretends that there was a marriage. I say this to you--that I
defy him and all of you, and will defy you all--yes, to the bitter end;
and you may go and tell this to your wretched confederates.”
As Edith said this, Mrs. Dunbar looked at her; and if there could have
appeared upon that face the signs of a wounded heart--a heart cut and
stung to its inmost fibre--the face that confronted Edith showed all
this at that moment.
“Confederates!” she repeated.
“Yes, you and Wiggins and this villain who, you say, is now living
here.”
“What, Leon!”
“Leon! Is that his name! Leon Dudleigh! Well, whatever name he chooses
to bear, it is all the same; though it seems strange that he should
adopt a stainless name like that of Dudleigh.”
“Yes, that is his name,” said Mrs. Dunbar, wearily.
“Till he assumes some other,” said Edith. “But they are all assumed
names,” she continued, bitterly--“Mowbray and Dudleigh and Dunbar also,
no doubt. Why you should call yourself Dunbar I can't imagine. You seem
to me to be Mrs. Wiggins. Wiggins at least can not be an assumed name.”
At these words, which were spoken on the spur of the moment, out of mere
hostility toward Mrs. Dunbar, and the desire to wound her, the latter
recoiled as though from some sudden blow, and looked at Edith with awful
eyes.
“You are terrible,” she said, in a low voice--“you are terrible. You can
not imagine what horrors you give expression to.”
To this Edith paid no attention. It sounded old. It was like what
Wiggins had frequently said to her.
“I can not imagine,” she continued, “any human being so utterly
bad-hearted, so altogether vile and corrupt, as this man who now calls
himself Leon Dudleigh. In pure fiendish malignity, and in all those
qualities which are abhorrent and shameful, he surpasses even, that
arch-villain Wiggins himself.”
“Stop, stop!” cried Mrs. Dunbar. “I can not bear this. You must not talk
so. How do you know! You know nothing about Leon. Oh, how you wrong him!
Leon has had bad associates, but he himself is not bad. After all, Leon
has naturally a noble heart. He was a brave, high-minded boy. Oh, if
you could but know what he once was. You wrong Leon. You wrong him most
deeply. Oh, how deeply you wrong him!”
Mrs. Dunbar had said all this in a kind of feverish agitation, speaking
quickly and vehemently. Never before had Edith seen any thing
approaching to excitement in this strong-hearted, vigilant-eyed,
self-contained woman, and the sight of such emotion amazed her. But for
this woman and her feelings she cared nothing whatever; and so in the
midst of her words she waved her hand and interrupted her.
“I'm tired,” she said; “I can not stand any more excitement just now. I
wish to be alone.”
At this. Mrs. Dunbar arose and walked wearily out of the room.
One thing at least Edith considered as quite evident front Mrs. Dunbar's
agitation and eager championship of “Leon,” and that was that this Leon
had all along been a confederate of Wiggins and this woman, and that the
so-called “Lieutenant Dudleigh” had been one of the same band of
conspirators. It seemed evident now to her that the whole plot had been
contrived among them. Perhaps Wiggins was to get one half of the estate,
and this Leon Dudleigh the other half.
Still she did not feel altogether sure, and in order to ascertain as
near as possible the truth as to her present position and prospects, she
determined to see Wiggins himself.
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