Elster's Folly: A Novel

by Mrs. Henry Wood

"When?"

"The winter before her death."

"Then the knowledge killed her!"

"No. Something else killed her, as you know. It preyed upon her spirits."

"Lord Hartledon, I can have you up for fraud and forgery, and I'll do it. It will be the consideration of Maude's fame against your punishment, and I'll make a sacrifice to revenge, and prosecute you."

"There is no fraud where an offence is committed unwittingly," returned Lord Hartledon; "and forgery is certainly not amongst my catalogue of sins."

"You are liable for both," suddenly retorted the dowager; "you have stuck up 'Maude, Countess of Hartledon,' on her monument in the church; and what's that but fraud and forgery?"

"It is neither. If Maude did not live Countess of Hartledon, she at least so went to her grave. We were remarried, privately, before she died. Mr. Carr can tell you so."

"It's false!" raved the dowager.

"I arranged it, ma'am," interposed Mr. Carr. "Lord Hartledon and your daughter confided the management to me, and the ceremony was performed in secrecy in London"