Mr. Aylett lifted his hand, smiling more evilly than before.
"Excuse the interruption! but after your statement of the fact that
such sentimental asseverations would be futile, you waste time in
recapitulating the loves of the lady aforementioned, and we in
hearing them. I think I express the opinion of the audience--fit,
but few--when I say that we require no other evidence than that
afforded by the story I have told of Mrs. Lennox's susceptibility
and capacity for affection. We are willing to take for granted that
the latter was illimitable."
"As you like!" idly tapping the nails of her left hand with the
knife. "Is there anything else pertaining to this history into which
you would like to inquire?"
It was a sight to curdle the blood about one's heart, this duel
between husband and wife, with double-edged blades, wreathed with
flowers. Mr. Aylett's attitude of lazy indifference was not exceeded
by Clara's proud languor. He laughed a little at the last question.
"I have speculated somewhat--having nothing else in particular to
engage my mind on my way home--upon the point I named just now, and
upon one other akin to it. All that the novel needs to round it off
neatly is an encounter between the real and the quasi consorts. I
cannot specify them by name, in consequence of the uncertainty I
have mentioned. One was a bona-fide husband--the other a bogus
article, let New York divorce laws decide what they will, provided
always that the fallen Julius had not bidden farewell to this lower
earth before his loyal Louise plighted her faith to her Southern
gallant. Death is the Alexander of the universe. There is no retying
the knots he has cut."
From the pertinacity with which he returned to the question one
could discern his actual anxiety to have it settled. Mabel
understood that the only salve of possible application to his
outraged pride and love was the discovery that Clara had been really
a widow when he wedded her. The divorce and subsequent deception
were sins of heinous dye against his ideas of respectability and
unspotted honor, but he would never forgive the woman who had had
two living husbands, freed from the former though she was by a legal
fiction.
No one saw this more clearly than did she whose fate trembled upon
the next words she should utter. With all her hardihood, she
hesitated to reply. Luxury, wealth, and station were on one side;
degradation and poverty on the other. The solitary hope of
reinstatement in the affection, if not the esteem, of him she loved
truly as it was in her to love anything beside herself, was arrayed
against the certainty of alienation and the tearful odds of
ignominious banishment.