"You forced yourself into my secrets," he said hardly. "It is too late to shrink back now. You shall know them to the full—and then you may go."
He paused, still holding her. In her horror, and under the sickly, stifling atmosphere of the room, she was almost fainting. But he paid no heed to her condition. His eyes were fixed malignantly on the grinning object of his hatred.
"That man," he said slowly, "was free from any hereditary weakness. His viciousness was not inherent. He came of a good, clean stock. When he was thirty—although the inevitable results of his violations had already seized upon him—he committed the crime of marrying. It was the foulest sin of his life. He knew what the result would be—what it was bound by every natural law to be. He knew that the sins of the fathers must be visited on the children"—he clenched his hands, and she winced as her wrist was crushed in his grip—"and knowing that, he dared to marry."
His voice rose. His face began to work with passion.
"He married a good woman—who bore all the cruelties he heaped upon her because she loved him. Her money had been his only consideration—and when he had got all that he treated her like dirt. But there are limits even to what a woman can bear. He broke her heart, and she died ... mad. If only she had died a little sooner...."
She steadied herself with an effort.
"Who is he?" she asked. "Why is he here, in your house?"
A flood of fury shook him.
"His name is Oscar Winslowe," he said fiercely. "He is my father."
She uttered a sharp cry, and wrenched her hand away from him.