"Or hers!" repeated Harrington, turning deathly white, "or hers—who are you speaking of?"
"Of the woman we both love. I cannot speak her name to you. How dare you brand that noble creature with shame, after using the privileges of my father's house to win her love? Was it not enough that you had stolen her heart from me—from us all? Could nothing but her disgrace content your horrible vanity?"
"Ralph, Ralph, in the name of Heaven, what is this?" cried Harrington, starting up with an outcry of terrible agony, which whitened his face to the lips.
"What is this!" thundered Ralph, "are you detected at last? arch hypocrite, that you are—desecrating the roof that you should have upheld, leaving traces of your wickedness on every thing that ever loved you. I ask you again, why did you seek her love? why, having won it, did you leave her to shame?"
"Ralph, speak briefly and clearly—what is it you mean? has your father put this cruel charge against me into your mind? No more hints, no more vague upbraidings—out with it at once—what do you charge me with?"
Ralph did not speak, there was a grandeur of passion in the man that held him silent.
"In the name of God, speak!" cried the brother, "you are killing me."
He spoke truly; no human strength could long have withstood the strain of anxiety that cramped his features almost into half their size, and made his strong hands quiver like reeds.
"In the name of God, speak!" he cried out again; "of what do they charge me?"
"I charge you," said Ralph, in a faltering voice, for the power of that man's innocence was upon him as he spoke; "I charge you with the ruin of the purest and noblest"—