Lord Linleigh looked thoughtfully at her.
"Do you know, Estelle, I have an idea that Doris is very much changed? Have you noticed it?"
"She seemed to me much fonder of Earle, and not so strong as she was; I have not noticed any other difference."
"Then it must be my fancy. She has seemed to me more thoughtful, at times even sad, then strangely reckless. A strange idea has come to me—do you think she has any secret connected with that former lonely life of hers?"
"I do not think so," replied Lady Estelle, growing very pale.
"That was a strange notion of yours, my dear, sending her there. Still, those good people seem to have done their best for her."
"I believe," said Lady Estelle, hastily, "that she was quite as safe as she would have been under my own roof. I think I have noticed what you mean—a nervous kind of uncertainty and dread: but I am quite sure it is not because of any secret. Ulric; it is rather because she has been overtaxed. I remember speaking to her about it some time since. She will soon be well now."
Lady Estelle was right. Away from that terrible incubus, the dread of meeting the man she feared and detested; away from his baneful influence, she speedily recovered health and spirits; the dainty color flushed back in her lovely face, her eyes grew radiant, sweet snatches of song came from her lips; she was once more the bright, gay Doris, whose winsome smiles and charms had won all hearts. Lady Linleigh laughed at her fears, and for a short time all was happiness at Linleigh Court.
Earle came down for a few days, and then the wedding-day was fixed. It was to be on the tenth of August, and when the wedding was over they were to go right away until Lady Doris had recovered her usual strength.
It was not until afterward that Earle remembered how strange it was that she should have hurried on the wedding; when he came to think it over, he found that it was so. It was Doris who planned and arranged everything; he had but acquiesced, he had not been the prime mover in it. So it was settled—the tenth of August; not many more weeks of suspense and anxiety, not much more dread. Her revenge and her love would be gratified alike. She should be Earle's wife on the tenth; on the twentieth, when Lord Vivianne came, she should be far away with Earle to protect her; Earle to shield her. It would be useless to pursue her then; even if he did his worst, and betrayed her, she did not care, her position would be secure. Oh, it would be such glorious revenge, to find her married, after all his solemn oaths that she should be his wife, and belong to no other—either to him or to death!