"Little hope of that," he said, with a deep sigh. "Two men alone amongst the living know the truth about that day, and, having once perjured themselves, they are not likely to recant."
"And those two are my uncle Rupert and his servant. What was the servant's name?"
"John Hilton, the man who was at the meeting at Porlock," my father answered, with a shudder at the recollection of that terrible night. "There was one other man who might have cleared me; but, as fate would have it, when I appealed for his evidence it was discovered that his name was on the missing list. He was either killed or taken prisoner."
"Who was he?" I asked.
"Sergeant Fenwick. Without doubt he was killed, or he would have been delivered over to us at the peace. No, unless Rupert confesses, and one might as well expect the heavens to fall in, I shall die dishonoured and nameless," my father concluded, bitterly.
I stood up and drew a long breath.
"Father," I cried in a low, intense tone, "have you never felt that you must seek out this hound of a brother of yours, and hold him by the throat until he has confessed, or until the breath is gone out of his body? I should feel like that! I should want to stand face to face with him and wring the truth from his lying lips."
My father's eyes were sparkling, and his whole frame quivering with compressed excitement.
"Ah, Hugh, I have felt like that," he cried, "many and many a time. Do you remember the night when we met him on the moor near Dunkerry? If I had been alone that night I should have killed him. I know that I should. It is for that reason that I dare not seek him out. If I heard him utter that lie again, if I saw in his eyes one gleam of pity for me whose life he has hopelessly wrecked, no power on earth could keep me from strangling him, and so I do not seek to meet him. But if chance throws him in my way again, when we are alone, God have mercy on him and me!"
There was a long silence between us. Then I asked him further questions about his present plans.