Levy paused again.
"Speak, sir," said the count, frowning.
"The fact is," said the baron, "that Mr. Leslie was anxious to complete a purchase of certain estates that had once belonged to his family, and that the count's marriage with the signora, and his sister's marriage with Mr. Hazeldean, would have enabled me to accommodate Mr. Leslie with a loan to effect that purchase."
"What! what!" exclaimed the squire, hastily buttoning his breast-pocket with one hand, while he seized Randal's arm with the other—"my son's marriage! You lent yourself to that, too? Don't look so like a lashed hound! Speak out like a man, if man you be!"
"Lent himself to that, my good sir!" said the count. "Do you suppose that the Marchesa di Negra could have condescended to an alliance with a Mr. Hazeldean—"
"Condescended! a Hazeldean of Hazeldean!" exclaimed the squire, turning fiercely, and half choked with indignation. "Unless," continued the count, imperturbably, "she had been compelled by circumstances to do that said Mr. Hazeldean the honour to accept a pecuniary accommodation, which she had no other mode to discharge? And here, sir, the family of Hazeldean, I am bound to say, owe a great debt of gratitude to Mr. Leslie; for it was he who most forcibly represented to her the necessity for this misalliance; and it was he, I believe, who suggested to my friend the baron the mode by which Mr. Hazeldean was best enabled to afford the accommodation my sister deigned to accept."
"Mode! the post-obit!" ejaculated the squire, relinquishing his hold of
Randal to lay his gripe upon Levy.
The baron shrugged his shoulders. "Any friend of Mr. Frank Hazeldean's would have recommended the same, as the most economical mode of raising money."
Parson Dale, who had at first been more shocked than any one present at these gradual revelations of Randal's treachery, now turning his eyes towards the young man, was so seized with commiseration at the sight of Randal's face, that he laid his hand on Harley's arm, and whispered him, "Look, look at that countenance!—-and one so young! Spare him, spare him!"
"Mr. Leslie," said Harley, in softened tones, "believe me that nothing short of justice to the Duke di Serrano—justice even to my young friend Mr. Hazeldean—has compelled me to this painful duty. Here let all inquiry terminate."