He resolved that he would sift the matter the very next time he went home.
“And you know absolutely nothing about him previous to that time?” he asked of Mr. Huntress.
“No, nothing; while he was evidently so young at the time he received the injury which deprived him of his reason that there was comparatively little that he could remember about himself. Of his father or mother he knew nothing; ‘Margery’ and ‘Jack’ are the only names that he has been able to recall, while his memories of them are very vague. I imagine, however, that the woman Margery must have been a sort of nurse who had the care of him.”
Everet Mapleson started and colored as he heard these names.
He instantly recalled the incident that had occurred a few days previous, on Broadway, when the poor old flower vender had detained him, believing that she had at last found the boy whom she had nursed so many years ago.
His first impulse was to tell Mr. Huntress of this adventure, but he checked the inclination, resolving that he would himself try to find old Margery again and glean all that he could from her regarding Geoffrey’s early history.
He began to realize that there was something very much more mysterious about their strange resemblance than had at first appeared.
It might not be so much a “freak of nature” as he had tried to think it, and if there was any important secret connected with the affair, he meant to ferret it out alone, and possibly it might give him an advantage over his rival in the future if he should stand in the way of his winning Gladys for his wife.
A little later, when he went in search of her, and found her pacing up and down the great hall leaning on Geoffrey’s arm, chatting with him in a free and unrestrained way, and saw both their faces so luminous and happy, and knew that already they had become all in all to each other, he ground his teeth savagely, and vowed that he would destroy their confidence and peace before another twelve months should elapse.
He stationed himself behind some draperies where he could see without being seen, and continued to watch them, although it drove him almost to a frenzy to see how happy and unreserved Gladys was with his rival.