He was still looking in the duke's grave face, and his words seemed to fail him, his lips grew dry and hot, his hands trembled.
"I am ashamed of my folly," he said, in a low, agitated voice, "and I find it hard to tell."
"You will remember, Lord Linleigh, that you are keeping us in suspense, and Lady Estelle is our only child. Be brief, for her mother's sake, if not for my own."
The earl continued:
"Do not think me a coward, your grace; I have faced the enemy in open fight as often as any soldier. I never fled from a foe, but I would sooner face a regiment of foes, each with a drawn sword in his hand, than stand before you to tell what I have to tell."
"Be brief, my lord," was the impatient comment. "Be brief."
"In a few words, then, your grace, I loved your daughter. I won her love, and privately, unknown to any person, save one, we were married twenty years ago."
The duchess uttered a low cry of sorrow and dismay. The duke suddenly dropped into his chair like a man who had been shot. A painful silence fell over the room, broken only by the sobs of Lady Estelle.
"Married!" said the duke, at last. "Oh, Heaven! has my daughter so cruelly deceived me?"
"The fault was all mine, your grace; shooting would be far too good for me. I persuaded her, I followed her, I made her wretched, I gave her no peace until she consented."