“This painful business will soon be settled, Doctor,” said he cheerfully. “Just answer a question or two, which, as a matter of form, I will put in writing, and then, if you will do me the honour to dine with me to-day, we can consult how best to make the statement public; without of course compromising your dignity. To begin. You hereby make declaration that you were never in gaol? never tried at any assizes? have never committed any act which rendered you liable to prosecution under our criminal law?”
He ran the words off carelessly, and paused for my answer. When none came, he looked up, his own penetrative, suspicious look.
“Perhaps I did not express myself clearly?” And he slightly changed the form of the sentence. “Now, what shall I write, Doctor Urquhart?”.
If I could then and there have made full confession, and gone out of that room an arrested prisoner, it would have been, so far as regarded myself, a relief unutterable, a mercy beyond all mercies. But I had to remember your father.
The governor laid down his pen.
“This looks, to say the least, rather strange.”
“Doctor,” cried one of the board, “you must be mad to hold your tongue and let your character go to the dogs in this way.”
Alas, I was not mad; I saw all that was vanishing from me—inevitably, irredeemably—my good name, my chance of earning a livelihood, my sweet hope of a home and a wife. And I might save everything, and keep my promise to your father also, by just one little lie!
Would you have had me utter it? No, love; I know you would rather have had me die.
The sensation was like dying, for one minute, and then it passed away. I looked steadily at my accusers; for accusation, at all events strong suspicion, was in every countenance now; and told them that though I had not perpetrated a single one of the atrocious crimes laid to my charge, still the events of my life had been peculiar; and circumstances left me no option but the course I had hitherto pursued, namely, total silence. That if my good character were strong enough to sustain me through it, I would willingly retain my post at the gaol, and weather the storm as I best could. If this course were impossible—