“Father! You!” The words escaped slowly from her lips at last.
Her father gave a bitter sigh.
“If we men could foresee these moments in our lives, we should not sin so lightly. Yes, I have done you the greatest injury that a father can do his child. I have tried all these years to persuade myself that the best atonement I could make was to keep you in ignorance of the truth; but now the truth has been forced from me, and you see me ashamed to look you in the face.”
“Don’t speak like that!” said his daughter, gently; “don’t look away from me! Why, I thought I had no father, but now—”
He looked up swiftly, a new hope in his eyes.
“You are going to forgive me, my child?” he said, and trembled.
“No,” said Belle, simply, “I am going to love you.”
He uttered a cry, and clasped her to him.
“After all,” she said presently with a tearful smile, “I was only a poor little music-hall singer before. It isn’t as if I had much character to lose, is it?”
“You are very good to me, my child. If you knew how often I have wanted to tell you who I was, and been afraid to do it! The Fates prepare some rough places for us, but the beds we make for ourselves are the hardest to lie on.”