As related, Mrs. Fubsby (who had resumed her maiden name) was not without personal attraction; but she was wasted in aspect, though only about forty—perhaps forty-five—years of age; and now her dark eyes were ablaze with rage and grief. Thus she spoke the truth when she said,
'I was a pretty young woman, Miss Ellinor, when I first met this wretch in human form; but disappointment, disgust, neglect, and shame, too, have all made me what I seem now—old-looking, wasted, and blasted!'
At this crisis Robert Wodrow came upon the scene. Entering abruptly and unannounced, he regarded the trio with extreme bewilderment. He saw Mrs. Fubsby, whom he knew not, convulsed with just indignation; Ellinor in tears on a sofa, her bowed face hidden in her hands, her whole air that of one completely crushed, and sitting gathered in a heap, as it were; while Sleath, pale with rage, spite, and baffled knavery, was about to withdraw.
Robert Wodrow never stopped to make any inquiry. He could only conceive one thing—that Ellinor had been somehow insulted or wronged. All the jealousy, fury, and hatred that had so long swelled in his heart now gushed up in fiercer heat, and, endued with thrice his usual strength thereby, he sprang upon Sleath, grasped him by the collar behind, and, with many a kick and heavy lash of his riding-switch thrust him from the room, down the stair, and headlong into the street, where by one final impetus from his foot he flung him in a half breathless heap by the kerbstone, and then closed the house door.
Gathering himself up quickly, Sleath hastened away, registering a truly infernal vow of vengeance—a vow all the deeper that it was unuttered.
Thus had light been suddenly and luridly thrown on the great secret of his life—the secret which prevented him from raising his eyes to Blanche Galloway, as stated in the fifth chapter of our first volume—which he dared not do as a married man.
He was decidedly unfortunate in his views regarding Ellinor Wellwood; and now the daughter of Nox—inevitable Nemesis—had overtaken him!
Panting with exertion, and with something of a grim laugh, Robert Wodrow returned to the room, muttering to himself,
'He'll not forget that last kick with my regulation boot, in the region of the os coccygis. By Jove, I haven't forgotten my Quain and Turner! And now to find out what all this was about.'
We need scarcely say that Ellinor's soul almost died within her at the contemplation of the two narrow escapes she had from ruin and despair!