"Surely," he said, "you have not been at F—— street, without your friend?—you have not indulged in high play, and no prudent person to guide you?"
"No!" said Robert, with bitter energy—"that night I did play—how, why, it is impossible for me to remember. Those few hours of wild sin were enough—they have stained my soul—they have plunged me into debt—they have made me ashamed to look a good man in the face."
"But I warned, I cautioned you!"
Robert did not answer, but by the gleam of his eyes and the quiver of his lips, you could see that words of fire were smothered in his heart.
"You would have plunged into the game deeper and deeper, but for me."
"Perhaps I should—it was a wild dream—I was mad—the very memory almost makes me insane. I, so young, so cherished, in debt—and how—to what amount?"
"Enough—I am afraid," said Leicester, gently—"enough to cover that pretty farm, and all the bank stock your nice old aunt has scraped together. But what of that?—she is in no way responsible, and gambling debts are only debts of honor—no law reaches them?"
"I will not make sin the shelter of meanness," answered the youth, with a wild flash of feeling; "these men may be villains, but they did not force themselves upon me. I sought them of my own free choice; no—I cannot say that either, for heaven knows I never wished to enter that den!"
"It was I that invited, nay, urged you!"