The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 116: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

MORE MYSTIFICATION 95 thread of our narrative. As a matter of course, the Earl of Curzon was not satisfied at the result of the adventures which have occupied the two or three preceding chapters. As we have already stated, he saw that he had been out- witted, but how, he could not altogether conjecture. That Gertrude had purloined the documents from his own apart- ment he failed not to guess, but the great mystery to him was how his own wife Editha had been his partner of the couch in the boudoir instead of Gertrude. He had assuredly locked the young abigail in that boudoir, and it was her voice which he had subsequently recognized, beyond all possibility of doubt, when he returned to that room later in the night. But while revolving all these things in his mind, he recollected that on seeking the couch in the boudoir, when fancying he was about to be clasped in the arms of Gertrude, he had locked the door; and he likewise recollected that in the morning the door was unlocked when Gertrude entered to ask if her mistress had rung. The door, therefore, had been unlocked by somebody; and if so, the presence of Editha in the couch with him might be easily accounted for by supposing that while he slept Gertrude had risen and changed places with the countess. Then, if this were the case, and if this supposition were the correct one, had the beautiful Gertrude been for any time his companion in that bed? At first he was inclined to believe so, but then he reflected that from the very instant he entered that couch and was clasped in the arms of the female occupying it, this female observed a profound silence, nor could he by coaxing or entreaty succeed in eliciting from her a single word. This circumstance proved, then, that it must have been Editha who was occupying that couch when he entered the room, Editha who received him in her arms, Editha | whom he had so fondly and passionately embraced, while all the time fancying that he was enjoying the transports of love in the arms of Gertrude. It was therefore quite clear, from this chain of reasoning, that Editha must have been in the room with Gertrude when he went thither in the dark, and that while Editha prepared to receive him in her arms, Gertrude’s voice deluded him into the belief that it was she herself who was the sole occupant of that couch which he sought. Having come to these conclusions, the Earl of Curzon felt conniclooolks (C(O)