“She did, poor girl, she did use every means to disenchant me. I remember it all now, her frowns, her pretty petulance, her terror at the thought of becoming my wife. But when I found she loved me, I would brook no refusals. Between Mrs. Barry and myself she was almost forced into that marriage.”
“She was a pitiable victim of circumstances,” said John Keith. “She had promised Louise to act a part, and could not get released from her promise. If she had refused the marriage, Mrs. Barry would have disinherited her niece.”
“But she loved me,” Cecil Laurens said, quickly.
“She adored you,” answered John Keith; “she told me so. She revealed to me the whole plot, and begged me to keep the secret. I must beg your pardon for this, Mr. Laurens, but how could I betray my noble friend Molly, and my heartless but idolized wife?”
“She, your wife, deserved no kindness at your hands,” said Cecil, angrily.
“She did not, that is true; but I was weak enough to love her still, and I went from your marriage to Staunton to see her. I found only her aunt, who told me that Louise’s child had died, and that she had gone away as a traveling governess with a rich lady. You know all the rest, Mr. Laurens—how she divorced herself from me so heartlessly and broke my heart. I went South and engaged in the business of orange growing several years, until a restless yearning drove me back here, or rather to Staunton, where I found Mrs. Everett on her death-bed.”
“She confessed all, then?” said Cecil.
“Yes, and produced my little daughter whom she had falsely said was dead. She told me that everything was right between my former wife and Mrs. Barry, that she had found out and forgiven the deception about Molly, but that Louise dared not confess to her marriage and the child.”
“The wicked woman!” Mrs. Laurens exclaimed, finding voice at last.
Apparently John Keith’s heart still held some lingering tenderness for the woman who had deceived him, for his brow clouded, and he said quickly: