He read on, and at the last words he started in surprise, and whispered, hurriedly:
“Viola, this latter clause? I did not know about that! I—I—shall be accused of being a fortune-hunter!”
“Oh, no; for the fact of my being my mother’s sole heiress was not generally known. In fact, papa has never told me of it, but Aunt Edwina mentioned it one day,” replied Viola, rising, and standing by his side, a pale, excited bride, with a strange fire burning in her splendid eyes.
They were alone where kindly Doctor Meade had left them to do their writing, and Maxwell looked wistfully at the beautiful, pallid face, longing to repeat the kiss he had dared to press on her lips at the close of their strange marriage vows.
But he remembered how cold and unresponsive they had been, and saw no invitation in her eyes now, so he stifled the longing, and said, quietly:
“If you will excuse me a moment, I will arrange with Doctor Meade for sending off this notice to the newspapers, and see if the cab I ordered has arrived.”
He hurried out, and the pale bride stood alone amid the ruin of her hopes and in the pride of her revenge.
She could think of nothing but of how cleverly she had turned the tables on Philip Desha and Florian Gay.
“They will be mystified by the suddenness of my marriage, and perhaps believe it was premeditated, after all,” she thought, hopefully. “What a clever man Mr. Maxwell is to have thought of this way of checkmating them. I shall always be very grateful to him, both for preventing my rash attempt at suicide and for helping me to my revenge.”
And it did not occur to her half-distraught mind then that a husband had a claim to more than gratitude at her hands.