"How fortunate," she added, going on with her soliloquy, "that Will Heath and Margie were married just at this time!—she swallowed that story whole. Well, I must confess it was calculated to stagger any one, though I was almost afraid she had heard something before about the facts; but it seems she had not."
The truth regarding the news that Mrs. Farnum had received from Lady Linton, and which the latter had so cunningly utilized to further her scheme to separate her brother and his wife, was this:
Sir William Heath had a cousin who bore the same name as himself, though without the title, of course.
He was three years older than the young baronet, and had been named for his uncle, with the hope that he would be received as the heir in case no son was born to the elder Sir William. But this was not to be.
From childhood the boy had been attached to his little, neighbor and playmate, Margaret Stanhope, and they had been engaged for years, as Mrs. Farnum told Virgie.
But being the son of a younger son, he had had to struggle somewhat for his education and position in life, and it was only a few months previous to Sir William's return from America that he had succeeded in securing a situation as private secretary to a nobleman, and thus felt that at last he had a right to marry the sweet girl whom he had so long and so fondly loved, and make a home for himself.
The marriage had been set for the 28th of June, but Lady Heath's sudden and alarming illness, it was feared, would necessitate a postponement. But when she began to improve, and the question being submitted to her, she, having a great fondness for both her nephew and his betrothed, had insisted that the marriage should proceed. It accordingly took place in the chapel at Heathdale, Sir William himself giving away the bride, as her father was not living. So it will readily be seen that there was a semblance of truth in nearly all that Lady Linton had written to Mrs. Farnurn.
She had not been quite sure that she would succeed in this part of her scheme, for it might be that Sir William had mentioned the fact of his having a cousin by the same name; so she had written her letter in a way to do no harm in case it did not help her plan. If Virgie did <i>not</i> know, however, she would readily take it for granted that it was her husband who had been married on the 28th, while the fact that a long engagement had existed would seem to prove that he had wilfully deceived her from the first, and tend to make her believe that her own marriage had been simply a farce.