Queenie stood still, with clasped hands and streaming eyes, listening to her mother's cruel words. Then she crossed over to Lady Valentine, who stood within the clasp of her husband's arms weeping bitterly.
"Georgie," she said, in a tremulous voice, "won't you speak to me? Don't you know me? Sydney recognized me and owned me for her sister, even though I stood in her way. Surely you will not disown me!"
Georgie lifted her head and looked at the beautiful pleader a moment in silence.
She was not a bad woman, this Lady Valentine, and for a moment an impulse of pity stirred her heart and prompted her to believe this strange story at which her husband had sneered, and which her mother affected to disbelieve.
If she had been left to herself the better impulse in her heart would have triumphed, perhaps. Even as it was a momentary tender remembrance came into her heart as she recalled the night of her father's and sister's death! She recalled his words:
"Georgie, forgive her; she was more sinned against than sinning. She went mad and avenged the wrong. Remember that when she comes back."
"How did he know she would come back?" thought Lady Valentine to herself, in wonder. "We all thought she was dead then. But perhaps dying eyes can see more clearly than others. Poor papa, must I go against his dying charge to me?"
Then she remembered what her husband had said to her a little while ago:
"Georgie, do not forget that you have married into a proud old family. Think of the disgrace to us all if you should own this impostor for your sister! True, she is beautiful and gifted, but what then? She is an actress! The men and women of our race do not descend to such. They amuse us on the stage—these clever people. We pay for our amusement, and that ends all. We have nothing in common. Do not allow this clever, deceitful woman to impose on you as she did on your brother-in-law."
Lady Valentine knew quite well what those words meant.