"It is the truth!" He looked at Leslie, scarcely imploringly so much as hopelessly, despairingly. "I had forgotten it! Yes," he went on almost fiercely, "I had forgotten it! I was so happy that I lost all memory of it! You, sir, who came as an accuser, who no doubt, think me an utter blackguard and lost to all sense of honour, shall be my judge as well as my accuser."
Ralph Duncombe shook his head.
"I do not wish——," he began; but Yorke silenced him with a gesture that was full of the dignity of despair.
"Hear me, please! Miss Lisle and I were engaged to be married—that is, months ago. We met at a place called Portmaris, and—" he glanced at Lucy—"sir, I loved her as truly and devotedly as you can love this young lady. We were to have been married——."
"You!" exclaimed Ralph Duncombe. "No, it was the Duke of Rothbury to whom she was engaged."
Yorke sighed.
"No, it was to me," he said. "I exchanged titles with my cousin, the duke; why, need not be explained. Leslie—Miss Lisle understands. It was a foolish trick, and, like most follies, has brought trouble and sorrow in its wake. But for that stupid freak—. We were to have been married, but on the eve of our marriage we were separated, torn apart by a wicked lie, which, aided by a wrongly addressed envelope, served to ruin our happiness. Miss Lisle thought I had deceived her, and, acting on the promptings of a heart that is all truth and purity, she cast me off. I lost her in all senses of the word, and I felt that I deserved to lose her. Now, sir, call your imagination to your aid. Look on this young lady whom you love, and try and put yourself in my place. Picture to yourself my state and condition, having lost all that made life worth living! Ah, you can!" for Ralph Duncombe looked down and bit his lip.
Yorke passed his hand across his brow and sighed heavily, and for a moment seemed as if he had finished his explanation; then he looked up, as if awaking suddenly.
"I was in that state in which a man might win pity from his worst enemy; but I had an enemy—of whose existence I was and am still ignorant—and he chose that moment to hunt me into still greater straits. I have been a fool in more senses of the word than one. I was heavily in debt. It was because of that millstone of debt that I had induced Miss Lisle to consent to a secret marriage. My enemy, whoever he was, discovered this; he bought up all my debts and liabilities, and constituting himself my sole creditor, he came down upon me with all the weight of those debts, meaning to crush me. I should have gone under, never to rise again. I should have been ruined and disgraced, should have brought disgrace upon the name I bear and all connected with me. But——." He paused, and his face worked. "There was one who—who had some little regard for me, and—and she stepped in and saved me; lifted me out of the mire and set me on my feet again; saved me from the consequences of my folly, and saved the old name from shame. Gratitude is a poor word to describe what I felt toward her! I—I made the debt I owed her still heavier by asking her to take that which she had saved. And—and in the goodness of her heart she consented! From that time until now—until now!—I have been true to her in deed and intent. I have striven to forget the woman to whom I had given my heart, there at Portmaris, the woman who was all the world to me"—his voice broke—"the woman whom I lost on our wedding eve! To-day, to-day only, have I heard from the woman who separated us a full confession of the deception by which she effected her purpose. But I knew it was too late to regain my lost happiness. Too late! I never expected to see Miss Lisle again, scarcely hoped to do so, excepting that it might be once before I died, that I might say to her, 'With all my faults and follies, I was true to you, Leslie!'"
Leslie, standing rigid and motionless, moaned faintly.