CHAPTER LXXXIV.
A MOTHER'S ANGUISH.
They wondered why Lord Linleigh allowed no one to take the fatal news to his wife but himself. The secret of her early ill-starred love and marriage had been so well kept all those years, it was useless to betray it now. He knew well what her anguish would be. He dreaded all scenes of sorrow, but he loved his wife, and no one must be with her in the first hour of her supreme trouble and bereavement.
He went to her room when the detectives left, and found Mattie still keeping watch over her. Before speaking one word to his wife, he turned to Mattie.
"Thank you, my dear," he said, gently; "you have carried out my wishes most faithfully. Will you go to Earle? Eugenie will take you where he is."
Then when she had quitted the room, Lady Estelle flung herself into his arms.
"Ulric," she cried, "tell me what is the matter? I know that something terrible has happened to Doris—what is it?"
"My darling wife," he said, "try to bear it. I have sad news for you—the saddest that I could bring you. Doris is dead!"
But even he, knowing how dearly the mother loved her child, was hardly prepared for the storm of anguish that broke over her.
"Dead!" she cried, "and never knew me as her mother! Dead! and never clasped her sweet arms round my neck! Dead! without one word! I cannot believe it, Ulric. How did it happen? Oh, my darling, my golden-haired child, come back to me, only just to call me mother! How did it happen, Ulric? Oh, I cannot believe it!"