"Then the title which you borrowed from your cousin awhile ago, and to some purpose, you have now succeeded in filching from him altogether?" said the girl coldly.
If she had the desire to hurt him, she certainly did succeed. Michael did not move, but his cheeks, already pale, turned to ashy grey; the eyes sank still deeper within their sockets, and in a moment the face looked worn and haggard as that of a man with one foot in the grave.
Then he said slowly:
"Your pardon, Mistress; I have filched naught which was not already mine, mine and my father's before me. That which I took was my right; it is also my mother's, who for years had been left to starve whilst another filched from her that which was hers. For her sake did I claim that which was mine, because during all those years of starvation, misery and degradation—her misery and mine own degradation—she kept up her faith in me. And also for mine own sake did I claim my right, and in order to mend a wrong which, it seems, I had committed. Good Master Legros," he added, turning to the vastly bewildered tailor, "as Lord of Stowmaries I entered your house and, methinks, your heart. Of this I am not ashamed; the wrong that I did you is past; the righting thereof will last my lifetime and yours. I was Lord Stowmaries then by the word of God—I am that now by the word of the King and Parliament. That which seemed a lie I have proved to be true. Will you give me back your daughter, whom the caprice of a wanton reprobate would have cast from him, and whom I have justly won, by my deeds, by my will, by my crime if you call it so, but whom I have won rightfully and whom I would wish to render happy even at the cost of my life."
Gradually, as he spoke, the tone of defiance died out of his voice and only pride remained expressed therein—pride and an infinity of tenderness. There was no attempt at mitigating the fault that was past, no desire to excuse or to palliate. The man and his sin were inseparable; obviously had the sin to be again committed, Michael would have committed it again, with the same determination and the same defiance.
"I am a man, and what I do, I do. I won you by a trick. I fought for your love and won it. Mine enemy put a weapon in my hand. With it I conquered him; I conquered Fate and you. Had I been ashamed of the act, I had never committed it. I looked sin squarely in the face and took it by its grim hand and allowed it to lead me to your feet. To you I never lied; you I do not cheat."
These thoughts and more were fully expressed in his eyes as they rested on Rose Marie, and so subtle is the wave of sympathy that she understood every word which he did not utter; she understood them, even though she steeled her heart against the insidious whisperings of a drowsy conscience.
We may well imagine that on the other hand, good M. Legros, though he did not altogether grasp the proud sophistries of such a splendid blackguard, nevertheless quickly ranged himself against the whole array of all the grim virtues. Would you blame him very much if you knew that within the innermost recesses of his kindly and simple heart he no longer greatly desired to speak with the man whom he had come all the way from Paris to supplicate and to warn?
Was it very wrong, think you, very self-interested on the part of this amiable little tailor to be now cursing those very necessities engendered by an ultrasensitive sense of loyalty which imposed on him the task of cleaving to that man who was now dispossessed, beggared, a most undesirable husband for his beautiful daughter?
Truly the situation, from the point of view of conscience and of decency, was a very difficult one. Is it a wonder that the doting father was quite unable to grapple with it?