"Speak," she said. "And I swear I'll answer nought but the truth—if I know the truth."
He hesitated, and considered her answer. He was fond of her still, but the circumstance of this deception, to which he supposed her a party, had gone far to shake his affection. The grievance was that the facts should have been hidden from him after his proposal. He held that then was the time when Cora's paternity should have been divulged. He believed that had he known it then, it would have made small difference to his love. It was not so much the fact as the hiding of the fact that had troubled him.
"Who was your father?" he asked at length, and the words burst out of him in a heap, like an explosion.
"I know who he was," she answered.
"Name him, then."
"You see, Timothy, you never asked. I often thought whether there was any reason to tell you, and often and often I felt you ought to know; but you're a wise and far-seeing man, and I wasn't the only one to be thought on. I'd have told you from the first, even at the risk of angering you, but there was mother. I couldn't do it—knowing what she'd feel. I was a daughter afore I was a sweetheart. Would you have done it when you came to think on your mother?"
"Name him."
"Nathan Baskerville was my father, and my sister's and brother's father. My mother was his wife all but in name, and they only didn't marry because it meant losing money. You understand why I didn't tell you—because of my poor mother. Now you can do as you please. I'm myself anyway, and I'm not going to suffer for another's sins more than I can help. There's no stain on me, and well you know it."
"Nathan was your father?"
"He was. I suppose Heathman told you. He's threatened to oft enough."