"How dare you traduce me thus?" Mrs. Noble shrieks, in anger and amazement.
"I dare, because I speak the truth before God," her enemy answers, fearlessly. "How dare you claim to be Leslie Noble's wife, when you know that I, his first wife, Vera Campbell, am living?"
[CHAPTER XXV.]
It was a striking tableau, there beneath the over-arching trees that fair, calm, summer night. Lady Vera's beautiful face was all pale with passionate scorn and indignation as she leaned upon her lover's arm. Her enemies had started back as her scathing accusation fell upon them, and they now regarded her with looks of wrath, blent with honest astonishment. Colonel Lockhart's face had turned to a dull, ashen gray, like the pallor of death, but he stood his ground bravely, like the soldier that he was. Lady Vera did not dare to look at him, but beyond one swift, convulsive start, as though a sword had pierced his heart, the arm that supported her did not even tremble. He had steeled himself to bear his pain and make no sign.
"Colonel Lockhart," Mrs. Cleveland exclaims, starting boldly to the front, "I would advise you to take Lady Fairvale home to her friends. She must surely be raving mad. I know not how she came into possession of any facts concerning us, but I swear to you, and can prove my assertion, that Vera Campbell, the first wife of my son-in-law, Leslie Noble, has been dead and buried three years. Is it not so, Leslie?"
"It is perfectly true," he answers, gazing curiously at the beautiful girl who has claimed him as her husband. "If Lady Fairvale be Vera Campbell Noble, then she has risen from the grave itself to claim me, for I saw her buried three years ago, and I erected a costly marble monument to her memory."
"She committed suicide!" Ivy screams out, spitefully. "She died in my mother's house. I saw her lying dead, and I saw her buried."
"Oh, shameless falsehood!" Vera breaks out, warmly. "I did not die, and you know it. The bitter drug with which I thought to end my wretched life, turned out to be only a sleeping potion after all. Will you deny, Marcia Cleveland, that Lawrence Campbell came to you that night to denounce you for the falsehood with which you had betrayed him, and to ask, at your hands, his wronged wife and child?"
Livid with rage and fear, the wicked woman stares at her fearless accuser. How has this beautiful countess, with Vera Campbell's face, learned the secret of her past life?