Mrs. Wilders bade her servant introduce the
stranger, and presently joined him in the adjoining room.
"Mr. Hyde," she began, composedly and very stiffly, "may I inquire the
meaning of this intrusion? You are a perfect stranger--"
"Look well at me, Cyprienne Vergette. Have years so changed me--?"
"Rupert? Impossible!" she half-shrieked. "Rupert is dead. He died--was
drowned--when--"
"You deserted him, and left him, you and your vile partner, falsely
accused of a foul crime."
"I cannot--will not believe it. You are an impostor; you have assumed
a dead man's name."
"My identity is easily proved, Cyprienne Vergette, and the relation in
which I stand to you."
"What brings you here to vex me, after all these years? I always hated
you. I left you--Why cannot you leave me in peace?"
"God knows I had no wish to see or speak to you again. The world was
wide enough for us both. We should have remained for ever apart, but
for your latest and foulest crime."
"What false, lying charge is this you would trump up against me?"
"The murder of my dearest friend and comrade. Murder twice attempted.
The first failed; the second, I fear, will prove fatal. If so, look to
yourself, madam."
"What can you do?" she said, impudently, having regained much of her
old effrontery.
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