"Why should I tell you?" she said, after a pause: "why reveal to you the shameful secret, and tell of a misfortune which is without a remedy? Clement is married: what words of mine can divorce him? And who will believe the evidence of a blind woman? If I were not blind, I might openly denounce her, but now--" And again she wrung her hands in unspeakable anguish.
Horace knelt beside his mother's couch and folded her hands in his own.
"I will believe you, mother," he said, earnestly. "Trust me--tell me all. If this woman whom my brother has married be an impostor, he may yet be freed from the matrimonial chain."
"Could that be possible?"
"It may be. Let me try, at least. I will devote myself to your service if you will but confide in me."
"Close the door, and then come near me, Horace--nearer still. I will tell you all."
Two days later the steamship Pereire sailed from New York for Brest, numbering among her passengers Horace Rutherford.
Chapter III.
Striking the Flag.
The events narrated in our last chapter took place early in November, and it was not till the following March that the astonished friends of Horace Rutherford saw him reappear amongst them as suddenly and as unexpectedly as he had departed. "Business of importance" was the sole explanation he vouchsafed to those who questioned him respecting the motive of his brief European tour; and with that answer public curiosity was perforce obliged to content itself. Society had, in fact, grown weary of discussing the affairs of the Rutherford family. Clement Rutherford's mesalliance, his mother's sudden illness at that memorable dinner-party, her subsequent seclusion from the world, and Horace's inexplicable absence, had all afforded food for the insatiable appetite of the scandal-mongers. Then Gossip grew eloquent respecting the flirtations and "fast" manners of Clement Rutherford's wife, and whispered that the old lady's seizure had been either apoplexy or paralysis, brought on by her distress of mind at her son's marriage, and that she had never been herself since. Next, the elegant establishment of the newly-wedded pair on Twenty-sixth street, with its gorgeous furniture and costly appointments, furnished a theme for much conversation, and doubts were expressed as to whether the "Upper Ten" would honor with its august presence the ball which Mrs. Clement Rutherford proposed giving on Shrove Tuesday, which in that year came about the middle of March. But as to that, it was generally conceded that they would. Youth, beauty, wealth and the shadow of an old family name could cover a multitude of such sins as rapid manners, desperate flirtations and a questionable origin; and notwithstanding her fastness, and, worse still, her ci-devant governess-ship, Mrs. Clement Rutherford was a decided social success.