“Oh, don't go—don't leave me yet, my Lady. What was it I said,—where was my poor brain rambling? Was I talking about Captain Darcy? Ah! that was the most painful part of all.”
“My God! what is it you mean?” said Lady Eleanor, as a sickness like fainting crept over her. “Speak, sir,—tell me this instant!”
“The bills, my Lady,—the bills that he drew in Glee-son's name.”
“In Gleeson's name! It is false, sir, a foul and infamous calumny; my son never did this thing,—do not dare to assert it before me, his mother.”
“They are in that pocket-book, my Lady,-seven of them for a thousand pounds each. There are two more somewhere among my papers, and it was to meet the payment that the Captain did this.” Here he took from beneath his pillow a parchment document, and held it towards Lady Eleanor, who, overwhelmed with terror and dismay, could not stretch her band to take it.
“Here—my Lady—somewhere here,” said he, moving his finger vaguely along the lower margin of the document—“here you'll see Maurice Darcy written—not by himself, indeed, but by his son. This deed of sale includes part of Westport, and the town-lands of Cooldrennon and Shoughnakelly. Faith, and, my Lady, I paid my hard cash down on the nail for the same land, and have no better title than what you see! The Knight has only to prove the forgery; of course he could n't do so against his own son.”
“Oh, sir, spare me,—I entreat of you to spare me!” sobbed Lady Eleanor, as, convulsed with grief, she hid her face.
A knocking was heard at this moment at the door, and on its being repeated louder, Hickman querulously demanded, “Who was there?”
“A note for Lady Eleanor Darcy,” was the reply; “her Ladyship's servant waits for an answer.”
Lady Eleanor, without knowing wherefore, seemed to feel that the tidings required prompt attention, and with an effort to subdue her emotion, she broke the seal, and read:—