"P.S.--Mother will keep this; she has come to see me die, so it will be quite safe. She does not know I am married, and I have written outside that no one is to read it till you are dead. Ah, Paul! I wish you could have seen it. Forgive me, Paul--forgive me that he is not your son!"
A greyness had come to the handsome face, and, as he folded up the letter methodically, his hands trembled.
"How long?" he asked; and it seemed almost as if he could not finish the sentence.
"Since the night of old Peggy's death. I suspected something, so I stole it."
"You suspected!" he interrupted quickly. "What could you suspect?" Then he laughed bitterly. "I suppose you suspected I was the boy's father, and thought the knowledge would be useful. If I had been it would have been better." His hand holding the letter came down heavily on the mantelpiece as he rose in sudden passion. "My God! what a devilish revenge!"
She gave a quick catch in her breath. She had been silent till now, but now it was time to begin--time to make him think.
"You forget that she repented--that she gave up her revenge. That is why I said nothing, Paul. I am a woman, too, and I know how she repented. I did not dare to speak--to disobey her dying wish; who has a right to do that, Paul?--no one."
"But the boy," he murmured, "the boy."
"The boy will not suffer. If you die he will have his rights, as his mother wished. If he were really your son he would not have Gleneira till then, and you can look after him. It is not as if he were in want, dear."
He sate listening, listening to that soft, persuasive voice, which had such a knack of following his every thought, and yet of leading them.