Two years passed away. There was no longer on Clementina's part, any pretence of affection for her husband; she went her own way, and devoted herself to her own interests and amusements. He wearied with a hopeless search and anxiety that found no relief, aged very rapidly, and became subject to serious attacks of illness, any one of which might deprive him of life.
His wife now regretted that she had married so hastily; the settlements promised had been delayed; she had trusted to her influence to obtain more as his wife than as his betrothed. She had not known of a counter-influence, and she had not calculated that the effort of a life-long deception might be too much for her. Quarrels had arisen in the very beginning of their life at Kurston, the disappearance of Athel had never been forgiven, and now Mrs. Kurston became violently angry if the settlement and disposing of his property was named.
One night, in the middle of the third winter after Athel's disappearance, Philip Lee called with an important lease for Mr. Kurston to sign. He found him alone, and strangely moved and sorrowful. He signed the papers as Philip directed him, and then requested him to lock the door and sit down.
"I am going," he said, "to confide to you, Philip Lee, a sacred trust. I do not think I shall live long, and I leave a duty unfulfilled that makes to me the bitterness of death. I have a daughter—the lawful heiress of the Kurston lands—whom my wife drove, by subtle and persistent cruelty, from her home. By no means have I been able to discover her; but you must continue the search, and see her put in possession of her rights."
"But what proofs, sir, can you give me in order to establish them?"
"They are all in this box—everything that is necessary. Take it with you to your office to-night. Her mother—ah, me, how I loved her—was a Polish lady of good family; but I have neither time nor inclination now to explain to you, or to excuse myself for the paltry vanities which induced me to conceal my marriage. In those days I cared so much for what society said that I never listened to the voice of my heart or my conscience. I hope, I trust, I may still right both the dead and the living!"
Mr. Kurston's presentiment of death was no delusive one; he sank gradually during the following week, and died—his last word, "Remember!" being addressed, with all the strong beseeching of a dying injunction, to Philip Lee.
A free woman, and a rich one, Mrs. Kurston turned with all the ardor of a sentimental woman to her first and—as she chose to consider it—her only true affection. She was now in a position to woo the poor lawyer, dependent in a great measure on her continuing to him the management of the Kurston property.
Business brought them continually together, and it was neither possible nor prudent for him to always reject the attentions she offered. The world began to freely connect their names, and it was with much difficulty that he could convince even his most intimate friends of his indifference to the rich and beautiful widow.
He found himself, indeed, becoming gradually entangled in a net of circumstances it would soon be difficult to get honorably out of.