“If you were in your right senses you would never deny that I am your wife,” answered the overdressed woman. “The thing’s too absurd.”
“My dear madam,” I cried, growing angry, “your allegations are utterly ridiculous, to say the least. All this is either some confounded conspiracy, or else you mistake me for somebody else. I tell you that I am Wilford Heaton, of Essex Street, Strand, a bachelor who has neither thought nor inclination of marrying.”
“And I tell you that you are Wilford Heaton, my husband, and owner of this house,” she answered, her face growing redder with excitement.
The situation was certainly stranger than any other in which a man could possibly be placed. That it was no dream, but a stern reality, was entirely plain. I glanced around the comfortable library, and saw there evidences of wealth and refinement, while through the window beyond my gaze fell upon the wide park sloping away to a large lake glistening in the sunshine, and through the trees beyond could be seen a distant glimpse of the blue waters of the English Channel.
I stood utterly nonplussed by the startling declaration of this artificial-looking person, who aped youth so ridiculously, and yet spoke with such an air of confidence and determination.
“And you actually expect me to believe this absurd story of yours, that I am your husband, when only last night I dined at The Boltons, and was then a bachelor? Besides, madam,” I added with a touch of sarcasm, for I confess that my anger was now thoroughly aroused, “I think the—well, the difference in our ages is sufficient to convince any one that—”
“No, no,” she hastened to interrupt me, as though that point were very distasteful to her. “Age is entirely out of the question. Am I to understand that you distinctly deny having made me your wife?”
“I do, most decidedly,” I laughed, for the very idea was really too ridiculous to entertain.
She exchanged a pitying look with Gedge, who stood at a little distance, watching in silence.
“Poor Wilford! poor Wilford?” she ejaculated in a tone of sympathy, and, addressing the man who called himself my secretary, said, “It seems quite true what the doctor has declared; the blow has upset the balance of his mind.”