She is playing a part, they thought; she wishes to impress us with the idea that she is a persecuted martyr--a suffering angel; and she hopes thus to regain her old footing amongst us, and queen it over the whole county, as she did when that poor infatuated Sir Oswald first brought her to Raynham. This was what the county people thought; until one day the tidings flew far and wide that Lady Eversleigh had left the castle for the Continent, and that she intended to remain absent for some years.
This seemed very strange; but what seemed still more strange, was the fact that the devoted mother was not accompanied by her child.
The little girl, Gertrude, so named after the mother of the late baronet, remained at Raynham under the care of two persons.
These two guardians were Captain Copplestone, and a widow lady of forty years of age, Mrs. Morden, a person of unblemished integrity, who had been selected as protectress and governess of the young heiress.
The child was at this time two and a half years of age. Very young, she seemed, to be thus left by a mother who had appeared to idolize her.
The county people shook their heads. They told each other that Lady Eversleigh was a hypocrite and an actress. She had never really loved her child--she had played the part of a sorrowing widow and a devoted mother for two years and a half, in the hope that by this means she would regain her position in society.
And now, finding that this was impossible, she had all of a sudden grown tired of playing her part, and had gone off to the Continent to spend her money, and enjoy her life after her own fashion.
This was what the world said of Honoria Eversleigh; but if those who spoke of her could have possessed themselves of her secrets, they would have discovered something very different from that which they imagined.
Lady Eversleigh left the castle in the early part of November accompanied only by her maid, Jane Payland.
A strange time of the year in which to start for the Continent, people said. It seemed still more strange that a woman of Lady Eversleigh's rank and fortune should go on a Continental journey with no other attendant than a maid-servant.
If the eyes of the world could have followed Lady Eversleigh, they would have made startling discoveries.