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WILD MARGARET, — gg
“ Violet, I swear that every instant you make me love
_ you more passionately! I see you think I lied when I said
you were not Blair’s wife, is it not so?”’
‘*T know that you lied!’ she retorted, as. calmly as she
— could.
‘“How little you know: me,”’ he said, gravely. “Do you -
think I am so great a fool as to make such an‘assertion for
the mere sake of making it?”’
~ “TfT am not Blair’s wife, who is?’ she, demanded, ag
if humoring him.
**Come,”’ he said, with a ‘smile; ‘that is better, because
it is more practical ‘and business-like. Continue this tone,
my dear Violet, and we shall speedily arrive at an ‘under-
standing. You want to know who is Blair’s wife? Cer-
tainly. It is a young lady who was Margaret Hale, but
Fore became the Viscountess of Leyton and Countess of
‘Ferrers.’”” °
She started, but it was only at the sound of Margaret’s
name.
‘*Margaret Hale! The girl—~”
“Bixactly. The girl he fell in love with at Leyton
‘Court. What an excellent memory you find when you
need it.’’
“* And you say he married. her? Oh, spare your breath! 1?
she broke off, with a contemptuous. gesture.
‘Thanks; T will,”? he said. ‘‘ Permit me to give you
ocular proof. ‘Here is the certificate of the cer emony ; not
a copy, please to observe: not a mere copy, but the origi-
nal itself. The ceremony, as you will see, was per formed
ata charming old church, in a rural and secluded spot
called Sefton. The date is set. forth in plain figures, to-
gether with all the particulars even the most exacting
lawyer could require.
She took the certificate, very much as poor Margaret
' had taken the: false one from Lottie Belvoir, and looked
at it with dazed eyes, then she crushed it in her hand,
and looked up at him as adumb animal looks up at the
man who has struck it.
‘““Married to her!—married to her!’ she murmured;
‘‘and he did not tell me!’ A spasm of jealousy shot
through her.: ‘‘ Then she was his wife?”
' “She was, most certainly,’’ he assented, watching her.
“But what has that to do’ with you and your plot?’ she
- demanded, raising herself after a moment and facing him
“contemptuously. ‘““This—this marriage-is a matter be-
tween me and Blair. ‘his certificate ig not a forgery—I
believe that.’’
- He looked at her steadily: