With it convulsively clasped in her hands, she fell upon her knees and sobbed:
"Oh, Heaven, spare me deeper sorrow! oh, do not confirm my shame!"
It was some time before she could compose herself enough to read that fatal missive, but at length she unfolded it and began to peruse it.
"Dear Myra," the letter began, "you may be surprised by the contents of this, but I cannot bring myself to address that person by the name which she claims, and so feel compelled to ask you to oblige me by giving her a message, or, perhaps what would be better, allow her to read this letter for herself. My brother is away from home just now, and, as my custom is in his absence, I open all letters of a private nature, and act as I judge best regarding them. The wildest epistle imaginable came to him yesterday and I was thankful that he was away, for he is so very happy that it must have shocked him exceedingly and I shall need to communicate its contents very delicately to him.
"That girl of whom you wrote me in your last actually claims to be his lawful wife—believes it, I suppose, poor child—and cannot understand how utterly impossible it would be for any one belonging to an old and honorable family like ours to ally himself with one so low in the social scale. I am shocked that my brother should have been guilty of anything so out of character as she represents while he was abroad. I am sincerely sorry for the wrong which it appears he has done her, if what she says is true, and shall insist that he provide comfortably for her for the future; but, of course, the idea that she has a right to come here as mistress is preposterous, and I trust that you will make it appear so to her. Advise her to renounce at once all claim to the name, and settle quietly in some place where she is not known, and perhaps she may be able to bring up her child in a respectable way, so that its prospects will not be hampered in the future by its mother's mistake.
"Will and Margie returned while I was writing to you, and both look so well and happy that it does my heart good to see them. Of course I had to stop for awhile, but now I will try and finish my letter. I have had a serious talk with my brother, and he appears to feel very much troubled over his American escapade, confessed that he had done wrong, and gave me this hundred pound note, which I inclose for the benefit of the girl; and I sincerely trust she will do nothing more to disturb a happy household, and one which will be very much annoyed by any useless scandal."
There followed a little more pertaining in an indifferent way to the above household, but Virgie had read enough, and the letter fell from her nerveless fingers, while she sat staring vacantly before her, her brain almost turned by the heartless words she had just read, her heart broken with its weight of woe, while a feeling of utter wretchedness and desolation made her long for death to steep her senses in oblivion.
She forgot all about the paper which had been given her with the letter, while the hundred-pound note, which had been inclosed with it, had fluttered out unheeded as she drew it from the envelope, and now lay upon the floor at her feet.
Later she examined the paper, and found a notice of the marriage of William Heath and Margaret Stanhope. Whether Lady Linton had been the cause of it to further her schemes, or whether some strange fatality had occasioned the mistake, it would be difficult to say, but the paragraph read: