CHAPTER XXVIII.

"For my mother's sake,
For thine and hers, O Love! I pity take
On all poor women. Jesu's will be done,
Honor for all, and infamy for none,
This side the borders of the burning lake."
ERIC MACKAY'S _Love-Letters of a Violinist_.

Lord Winsleigh did not move. Sir Philip fixed his eyes upon her in
silence. Some occult fascination forced her to meet his glance, and the
utter scorn of it stung her proud heart to its centre. Not that she felt
much compunction--her whole soul was up in arms against him, and had
been so from the very day she was first told of his unexpected marriage.
His evident contempt now irritated her--she was angrier with him than
ever, and yet--she had a sort of strange triumph in the petty vengeance
she had designed--she had destroyed his happiness for a time, at least.
If she could but shake his belief in his wife! she thought,
vindictively. To that end she had thrown out her evil hint respecting
Thelma's affection for George Lorimer, but the shaft had been aimed
uselessly. Errington knew too well the stainless purity of Thelma to
wrong her by the smallest doubt, and he would have staked his life on
the loyalty of his friend. Presently he controlled his anger
sufficiently to be able to speak, and still eyeing her with that
straight, keen look of immeasurable disdain, he said in cold, deliberate
accents--

"Your ladyship is in error,--the actress in question is the wife of my
secretary, Mr. Neville. For years they have been estranged--my visits to
her were entirely on Neville's behalf--my letters to her were all on the
same subject. Sir Francis Lennox must have known the truth all
along,--Violet Vere has been his mistress for the past five years!"

He uttered the concluding words with intense bitterness. A strange,
bewildered horror passed over Lady Winsleigh's face.

"I don't believe it," she said rather faintly.

"Believe it or not, it is true!" he replied curtly. "Ask the manager of
the Brilliant, if you doubt me. Winsleigh, it's no use my stopping here
any longer. As her ladyship refuses to give any explanation--"

"Wait a moment, Errington," interposed Lord Winsleigh in his coldest and
most methodical manner. "Her ladyship refuses--but _I_ do not refuse!
Her ladyship will not speak--she allows her husband to speak for her.
Therefore," and he smiled at his astonished wife somewhat sardonically,
"I may tell you at once, t