And at the sound of that voice all hope of love, all thought of happiness died out of Laline's heart. Her dream was over. Not the man she loved but this man whom she hated was her husband.
The whole truth poured in upon her brain as a sudden shaft of light in those terrible moments of silence. Five words told the story. There were two Wallace Armstrongs, and she had chosen to persuade herself that the one she loved was her husband. This man who stood before her now, with mocking laughter in his voice, an echo of which had haunted her dreams—this man, whose very clothing exhaled a nauseous perfume of spirits and whose accents were husky with drink, was the husband to whom she had pledged herself until death should part them on that fatal summer morning.
There was much to be explained, much that she could not understand; but of this one awful fact she was convinced and needed no further testimony. He had come into her life again, and already his sinister shadow had darkened all its sunshine.
So she stood before him in the twilit room and lived a lifetime of despairing grief before he spoke again.
"I am really exceedingly sorry to disappoint you," he said. "I suppose you expected my cousin? Your servant made a similar mistake at first. From your greeting I presume that I may congratulate him?"
"Yes, you presume," she said, and, passing him swiftly, she gained the door.
"One moment, please," he interposed, before she had time to leave the room. "I don't think there is any mistake on my part. I have come here on an introduction to Mrs. Sibyl Vandeleur, the celebrated sorceress or thought-reader or pin-finder—I don't quite know how she styles herself. I was not aware, until I arrived at the house, of the—well, the very intimate terms upon which my cousin was received here."
He paused, as though he expected her to speak. At every word he uttered in those leisurely sneering tones which she ought never to have forgotten Laline hated him a little more. She wondered now how she could ever have believed that such a man as this could grow gentle and chivalrous, unselfish and kind. Bitter and contemptuous in manner he had always been, but there was about him now an added recklessness—outcome of a savage scorn against himself and all the world. In manner he was the antithesis of his cousin, and yet every now and then Laline caught in his voice some inflection which reminded her of the man she loved. Even by this light she realised that in figure he was a little taller and of much heavier build than his namesake, and already inclining to the unhealthy stoutness which comes of lazy and dissipated habits.
It was strange that this time she felt but little of the fear of recognition she had before experienced when she believed herself in the presence of her husband. This man and she seemed in spirit so many leagues asunder, and there was so strong a barrier of gross material instincts between his mind and hers, that Laline intuitively knew he would not remember her. One woman would be the same as another to him; he would be incapable of differentiating between them. Moreover, any other thought she might entertain about him was swallowed up in the overpowering sensation of physical dislike with which he inspired her. In this dislike fear had a part, but it was the shrinking horror of a delicate and refined nature when confronted by one essentially coarse and brutal, and not a personal fear lest he should know and claim her as his wife which moved Laline.