University of Virginia Library

23. CHAPTER XXIII.

Mr. Dryman to Mr. Fleetwood.

My Dear Sir:—At the request of the gentleman,
who will hand you this letter, and in conformity
with my own duties as the protector of the
interests of my client, I have carefully investigated
circumstances in the history of a young lady known
to you under the name of Adelaide Winfield. I
have ascertained, and can satisfactorily establish,
that she is the legitimate daughter of the late Edward
Challoner, and that in her mother's right,
who was a daughter of the late John Gordon, Esq.,
she is heiress to a considerable property. The incidents,
which led to the concealment of her real
name and history, are simply these: her father
died suddenly, leaving his wife with her unborn
child in humble lodgings, the very locality of
which was unknown save to two or three persons.
She had been discarded by her parents in consequence
of her marriage, and knew of no one to
whom to apply for relief. An old servant named
Jenny was her only attendant. In the midst of
her distress, and while in the very pangs of child-birth,
which had been hastened by the sudden communication
of the news of her husband's death, a
woman named Winfield called upon her, and
charitably ministered to her wants. The mother
hardly lived to thank her for her kindness, however,
but died in giving birth to a female child.
The witnesses to the identity of this child with the
young lady known to you as Adelaide Winfield,

are Mrs. Winfield, the woman Jenny, and Dr.
Brisk, who had accidentally been called in to the
accouchement, as the nearest physician. In addition
to these there are collateral proofs, which place the
fact of the identity beyond a cavil.

I wish, for the honor of human nature, that I
might stop here in my narrative, and not be compelled
to unravel the conspiracies which have been
formed against the freedom and welfare of this
young girl. It appears that Mrs. Winfield, having
received intelligence of the death of a daughter of
her own, suddenly formed the determination to
claim and adopt the infant thus suddenly left an
orphan. By heavy bribes she induced the woman
Jenny and the aforementioned Dr. Brisk to conceal
the real name and history of the late Mrs. Challoner.
At the coroner's inquest a different name was
mentioned; and, in consequence, the family of the
deceased were kept in ignorance of her fate; and
her father, in his dying moments, overcome with
remorse, left a clause in his will by which a third
of his immense property was to be retained for
eighteen years in the hands of trustees for the benefit
of his missing daughter, or her child. If, at
the end of that time, no intelligence of either had
been gathered, then the property was to revert to
the other heirs. It now wants but a day of the
expiration of the trusteeship.

Not many years after the death of his father, the
present Mr. Gordon was satisfied of the validity of
the claims of the aforementioned Adelaide, as inheritress
of the property, which was rapidly accumulating
under the frugal management of prudent trustees.
But instead of manfully promulgating those
claims, he entered into a league with Mrs. Winfield
to keep the girl Adelaide in ignorance of her true
prospects and position, with the view of ultimately
enjoying her wealth. In furtherance of this object,

various plots and counterplots have been entered
into by both parties, each distrusting the other in
turn, and yet being all the while so held by the
other, as to be afraid of coming to an open rupture.

On hearing of the occurrences at Soundside, in
which you were an actor, Mrs. Winfield took the
alarm and went immediately to remove Adelaide,
whom she claimed as a daughter, to her own house
in the city. In the village she encountered an acquaintance
in the person of Mr. Glenham. Adelaide,
true to her promises to yourself, refused to
accompany her mother (as she supposed her to be)
to the city. Fraud was then resorted to, and it
was successful. A letter bearing your signature
was forged, by which Adelaide was made to believe
that it was your pleasure she should place
herself under the protection of Mrs. Winfield.
They came to the city; and here a new and important
agent in the plot appeared in the person of
Mr. Gordon. This man seems to have set his
heart on two objects. One was to prevent any
knowledge of the existence of his niece coming to
the ears of the trustees of her property; and the
other was to marry you to his daughter. To accomplish
these objects no means seem to have been
regarded by him as too base.

You must remember the night of the thunderstorm,
when Count La Salle, on entering the parlor
at Mr. Gordon's found Emily in your arms, and,
in a paroxysm of jealousy, took leave of you both.
In an evil moment he was tempted to wound you
in the same way that he believed you had wantonly
wounded him. He was told that you were
deeply enamored of Adelaide, at the same time that
you spurned the idea of marrying her. The
scheme, of which you were the victim, was proposed
to him on the ground that it would save the
young girl from your snares as well as punish you

justly for the wrong you had done him. He consented
to pass himself off, before you, as the fortunate
lover of Adelaide, and before herself as her
brother. The success of the imposition was complete.
Had you paused but an instant before jumping
to a conclusion, and heard Adelaide's exclamation
of brother Ernest! as she rushed to his embrace,
you might have been undeceived; but the
shock overwhelmed you, and the plot was managed
by the contrivers with diabolical skill.

You will already have seen how important the
agency of Mr. Glenham has been throughout in
this conspiracy against the peace and welfare of a
young, innocent and noble-minded girl. It was he,
who lured her from Soundside by his vile forgery—
it was he who suggested the plot by which you
were to be made to believe she had been unfaithful—it
was he, who baffled, by his falsehoods within
falsehoods and his cowardly intrigues, the repeated
attempts of Count La Salle to enlighten you as to
the imposture that had been practised, or to communicate
to Adelaide all that he knew and all that
he suspected.

But it seems that traitors cannot be true even to
one another. While Mr. Gordon was counting
upon the zealous co-operation of his accomplices,
Glenham and Mrs. Winfield, these two were contriving
how they could best subserve their own interests
apart from his. From prudential considerations
Gordon had always deferred pledging himself
in any manner by written agreements to compensate
Mrs. Winfield in the event of the reversion
of Adelaide's property to himself. But in Glenham
she found a person not quite so wary and careful.
He did not scruple to pledge himself both by written
and spoken oaths to give her one half the property,
which would come under his control on his
union with Adelaide. These calculations were utterly

baffled by Adelaide, who not only refused to
listen to his proposals, but fled from the protection
which he proffered, as well in the name of friendship
as of love.

I need not add more except that Mrs. Winfield
has made a full confession of her entire connexion
with this painful and extraordinary affair; and that
she now seems truly penitent. The woman Jenny
and Dr. Brisk have also both made confessions,
which confirm the story I have related, in many of
its important particulars. Count La Salle will himself
communicate what must satisfy you, were all
other testimony wanting, that you have been the
victim of the most inhuman deception, and that
Adelaide Challoner is innocent and pure. It is
proper that I should mention that I have communicated
to the trustees of her property the fact of her
existence, and that measures have been already
taken to substantiate her claims. I hardly think
they will be disputed, inasmuch as it can be proved
that the present Mr. Gordon has admitted them
fully.

Hoping, my dear sir, that the young lady may
recover speedily from her present serious indisposition,
and that all happiness may be in store for
her and you, I am,

Yours, faithfully,
Littleton Dryman.