“With the usual concomitants, I suppose, and perhaps had not been too roughly rebuffed. He was better-looking then, wasn’t he? Well, under the circumstances, no doubt, a mere martyr in badly fitting clothes, and without a foot, would have seemed horrible to any refined young woman. Husbands often assume that appearance to wives who chance to have followed their finer instincts, and fallen in love with somebody else. But what became of our martyr? Is he now preaching Christianity among the benighted Mahommedans?”
“You are cruel to me,” said Edith, with something like a sob.
“Then learn patience from the example of the martyr, who seems to have suffered much without complaining, for conscience’ sake—like you, dear Edith, and—answer the question.”
“I told him,” she said, in a low voice, “that as he was dead, he had better remain dead. He went away; I don’t know what became of him, or whether he is alive or not.”
“Then allow me to reassure your anxious heart upon that point. To the best of my belief, unless I am very much mistaken, the admirable Rupert is at present living in an oasis called Tama, somewhere in the desert, not far from the Soudan; I don’t know the exact locality, but doubtless it can easily be ascertained. Moreover, he has prospered better than most martyrs do, for with characteristic folly, he has paid back £2,000, which he did not owe, to the Government, in some particularly stupid and roundabout fashion. By the way, you never claimed his insurance, did you? No. Well, that’s lucky, for you might have been prosecuted. To return—in this happy oasis, as I believe, Rupert lives at ease, assisting its fair ruler to govern some primitive community, who apparently grow dates and manufacture salt for his and her benefit, for he seems to have relaxed his iron principles sufficiently to allow himself to contract a morganatic marriage, of which, under the circumstances, you will be the last to complain.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Edith, with some energy. “It’s not like Rupert to break his word.”
“It would be like a born idiot if he didn’t. Why should you have a monopoly in that respect?” Lord Devene answered, with withering sarcasm. “But perhaps the best thing to do would be to go and find out. Look here, Edith,” he said, dropping his bitter, bantering tone, “I have never set up for virtue; I hate the name of it as it is commonly used, but I must tell you that I think you an exceedingly wicked woman. What business have you to treat the man whom you had married in this way, just because you had been philandering with that accursed Dick, and because he had lost his leg and his prospects of a title? Well, his leg won’t grow again, but the title is sprouting finely. Hadn’t you better make haste and secure it? Lady Devene sounds better than Mrs. Ullershaw, relict of a forgotten colonel in the Egyptian army. Also, perhaps you would be happier as the wife of an honourable man than as the friend of Dick Learmer.”
“I’m not his friend,” replied Edith indignantly, “—now after what you have told me, for it was base to try to blacken the reputation of a dead man. Also, I don’t like him at all; his ways of life and even his appearance disgust me.”
“I am glad to hear it,” said Lord Devene.
“As for your reproaches about poor Rupert,” she went on, “you find it convenient to forget that it was you who forced me into that marriage. I never pretended to be in love with him, although it is true that now, when I am older, I see things in a different light, and have more regard for him than ever I had before.”