Lady Linton wrote a very bold, almost masculine hand, and it would hardly have been possible for anyone to be so near the book and not catch something written there.
The words which the baronet saw were under the date of August 15, and read thus:
“Another letter from that girl in New York.”
He lifted his glance for an instant to Virgie—hesitated, then resolutely bent his eyes again upon the page and read on, while Virgie wondered at the act.
“* * * * Will she never have done sending her whining, nauseating love-missives to W?” said the diary. “My patience is exhausted watching the mail bag, lest by some chance he should get one, and all my nicely laid schemes be upset just as success seems so sure.”
He turned a few leaves, glancing with lightning-like rapidity over them until he came to another entry that arrested his attention.
“The plot has worked to a charm, Myra says she accepted the whole story for a fact, and believes W. really untrue to her. She claims though that the child is legitimate, and says she will yet prove it. She threatens divorce—not wishing to hold a man unwillingly bound, ha! ha! If she will only carry out that project, my heart will be at rest.”
Still further on he read:
“The girl has gone—disappeared, and no one knows whither. Her last letter was really quite tragic, but, thank fortune, it was the last; she said it was a final plea, but the paper writhed and seemed almost like a thing of life as I burned it; it nearly gave me the horrors. But I can afford to suffer a few stings for the sake of keeping that low-born girl from disgracing the house of Heath. W. will get over his moping by and by, and marry again befitting his rank; but if he does not, why, Percy and Lillian will be the gainers.”
The book dropped from Sir William’s nerveless fingers at this point, for a terrible passion was raging within him as the heartlessness, the treachery and cunning of his sister were revealed. He understood everything now; he realized how his sister had schemed and plotted the ruin of all his hopes, out of spite against the innocent girl whom he had married, and in the hope that he would choose a wife from the English aristocracy.