“Very well,” said I, “I’ll send for him.” And I rose as if to obey.
“Don’t go just yet,” she went on; “there’s something more.”
I sat in silence so long that I began to think she was asleep or unconscious. But finally she spoke: “I got Walter’s permission this morning. James, if I tell you of a great wrong he has done, a very great wrong, will you forgive him for my sake?”
I thought over her request. Finally I said, “Yes.”
“Look at me,” she went on. Our eyes met. “Say it again.”
“Yes, I will forgive him,” I said, and I meant it—unless the wrong should prove to be one of those acts for which forgiveness is impossible.
She turned her face away, then said, slowly, each word coming with an effort: “It wasn’t James who forged your name. It was Walter.”
I felt enormously relieved, for, while I shouldn’t have hesitated to break my promise had it been wise to do so, I am a man who holds his word sacred even to his own hurt, provided it is not also to the jeopardy of vital affairs. “I’m not surprised,” said I. “It is like Walter to hide behind any one foolish enough to shield him.”
“No—he’s not that way any more,” she pleaded, her passion for shielding her children from my justice as strong as ever. “He told me long ago—when you caught him in that speculation. And we talked it over and then we went to see James, and he insisted that we shouldn’t tell you.”
“Why?” I asked. “What reason did he give?”