"You are as dear to me as ever!" she cried, putting her arms round his neck. "You are my true father--my real father! I shall never think of you as anything else. Oh, thank God--thank God!" And she wept and kissed him by turns.
"Amen!" said Beauchamp in a solemn tone. "But we have much to do before things are put straight. There is the cause of all my trouble, and I must deal with him." He rose and crossed to where Lestrange, white and shaking, was in the grip of Thorold. "What have you to say for yourself, Lestrange?"
The man made a violent effort to recover his self-control, and partially succeeded.
"I have to say to you what I shall shortly say to the world: You are a murderer!"
"That is a lie!"
"It is no lie. You murdered that girl's father?"
"That is a lie!" repeated Beauchamp sternly. "Do you think I am a Judas, to kiss that innocent girl if I knew myself to be her father's murderer? I knocked your cousin Achille senseless, and well he deserved it; but it was not I who stabbed him to the heart. It was you, Jean Lestrange!"
"I--I----" gasped the wretch, his lips white, his limbs shaking under him. "You dare--to--to--accuse--me--of----"
"I do not accuse you," said Beauchamp solemnly. "Out of the mouth of the dead you are condemned. Here is the confession of Warrender, and in it he tells the truth. You are the murderer of Achille!"
Sophy uttered a cry of horror, and throwing herself back on the couch, hid her face from the guilty wretch. He strove to speak, but no words came, and he continued to look silently on the ground. But for the support of Thorold he would have fallen.