You will
leave this vessel with me, and with no one else."
"Stand out of the way, fellow," cried Percival Nowell; "my daughter can
have nothing to say to you."
"Marian, for God's sake, obey me! There is the vilest treachery in this
man's conduct. Let go his arm. My love, my darling, come with me!"
There was a passionate appeal in his tone, but it produced no answer.
"Marian!" he cried, still interposing himself between these two and the
passage to the landing wharf. "Marian, I will have some answer!"
"You have had your answer, sir," said Percival Nowell, trying to push him
aside. "This lady does not know you. Do you want to make a scene, and
render yourself ridiculous to every one here? There are plenty of lunatic
asylums in New York that will accommodate you, if you are determined to
make yourself eligible for them."
"Marian!" repeated John Saltram, without vouchsafing the faintest notice
of this speech. "Marian, speak to me!"
And then, as there came no answer from that shrinking clinging figure,
with a sudden spring forward, that brought him quite close to her, John
Saltram tore the veil away from the hidden face.
"This must be some impostor," he said; "this is not my wife."
He was right. The creature clinging to Percival Nowell's arm was a pretty
woman enough, with rather red hair, and a common face.
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