“Not so fast. You start on a fundamental error. A grievance, as I take it, can only separate friends. There can be no question of such a misunderstanding between us, for we have always been enemies.”
“That’s your fancy,” cried he; “that’s your mistaken fancy! I’m not one to wear my heart on my sleeve. If I’ve always repressed show of my innate regard for you, you’re not to think it didn’t exist.”
“Why waste so many words? That’s a good form of regard, to act the bulldog to us, as you always did. It was a chastening sense of duty, I suppose, that induced you to leave me for years under an ugly stigma when you knew all the time that I was innocent. Is your valued friendship for the old man best expressed by blackmailing and robbing him on the strength of a fragment of circumstantial evidence?”
“I have made myself particeps criminis. Does that go for nothing? A little consideration was due to me there. A moiety of the treasure he was squandering, I took advantage of my influence to secure in trust for his children. You shall have it all back again some day, and should show me profound gratitude in place of sinister disbelief.”
“A fine cheapening of cupidity, and well argued. How long were you thinking it out?”
“As to that question of the suspicions you labored under—remember that any conclusion drawn from circumstances was hypothetical. I may have had a professional opinion as to the cause of death, and a secret one as to the means employed. That was conjecture; but if you are fair, you will confess that, by running away to London, you did much to incriminate yourself in men’s minds.”
“I never looked upon it in that light.”
“I dare say not. Innocence, from its nature, may very often stultify itself. I think you innocent now. Then I was not so certain. It was not, perhaps, till your father sought to silence me, that my suspicions were diverted into a darker channel.”
“You put a good case,” I said, amazed at the man’s plausibility. “You might convince one who knew less of you.”
“You can prove nothing to my discredit. This is all the growth of early prejudice. Think that at any moment I might have denounced him and left the proof of innocence on his shoulders.”