"Oh, you vile man! to marry again in this haste! You--you--I
can't find words that I should not be ashamed of; but Hamlet's mother, in
the play, was nothing to it."
"It is some time since I read the play," returned Hartledon, controlling
his temper under an assumption of indifference. "If my memory serves me,
the 'funeral baked meats did coldly furnish forth the marriage table.'
_My_ late wife has been dead eighteen months, Lady Kirton."
"Eighteen months! for such a wife as Maude was to you!" raved the
dowager. "You ought to have mourned her eighteen years. Anybody else
would. I wish I had never let you have her."
Lord Hartledon wished it likewise, with all his heart and soul; had
wished it in his wife's lifetime.
"Lady Kirton, listen to me! Let us understand each other. Your visit here
is ill-timed; you ought to feel it so; nevertheless, if you stay it out,
you must observe good manners. I shall be compelled to request you to
terminate it if you fail one iota in the respect due to this house's
mistress, my beloved and honoured wife."
"Your _beloved_ wife! Do you dare to say it to me?"
"Ay; beloved, honoured and respected as no woman has ever been by me yet,
or ever will be again," he replied, speaking too plainly in his warmth.
"What a false-hearted monster!" cried the dowager, shrilly,
apostrophizing the walls and the mirrors. "What then was Maude?"
"Maude is gone, and I counsel you not to bring up her name to me," said
Val, sternly.
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