"True," replied Norries; "there are some things in law which have no remedy, as I do well know; but it is right that the son should learn who ruined his father, and he should have known long ago, but for one circumstance which may perhaps operate still farther."
"What is that?" demanded the baronet, quickly; "I have no objection whatsoever to give a considerable sum for the possession of those papers. They can be of no use to any one but myself. Come, let us talk reasonably, Mr. Norries--let us say a thousand pounds."
"Money will not do, here, sir," answered the other, in a contemptuous tone; "it had its effect upon Mr. Sherborne, who was a rascal; but it will have no effect upon his partner, who is an honest man."
"Then what, in heaven's name, do you want?" demanded Sir Arthur Adelon.
"To see you act up to your professions, Sir Arthur," replied Norries. "At the election which began poor Mr. Dudley's ruin, and which I had some share in conducting on your part, you professed, and I really believe entertained--for I think that, in that at least, you were sincere--principles of firm and devoted attachment to the cause of the people. You declared that if they did but return you to parliament, you would advocate all measures in favour of their rights and liberties; you were more than what is called a Radical--you were a Reformer in the true sense of the word; you gloried in being descended from the old Saxon race; you pointed out that your name itself was but a corruption of that of one of our last Saxon princes; and you promised to do your best to restore to the people that perfect freedom which is an inalienable inheritance of the Saxon blood. You called your son Edgar, in memory of Edgar Atheling, and you promised, in my hearing, to maintain those principles at all times and under all circumstances, with your voice, with your hand, with your heart's blood. Now, Sir Arthur, I call upon you to redeem that promise; and if you do, in the way I shall point out, you shall have those papers. I have kept them back from the person to whom, perhaps, they ought justly to have been given, because I would not blacken the name of one whom I believed to be a true patriot. I found excuses for you in your own mind to excuse to myself my retention of them. I knew you to be a man of strong passions under a calm exterior; I knew that strong passions, whenever they become masters, are sure to become despots; and I thought that you had acted to the man we have mentioned, under an influence that was overpowering--the influence of the strongest and most ungovernable of all the passions: the thirst for revenge."
"Revenge!" exclaimed Sir Arthur. "Who told you I was moved by revenge?"
"No one told me," answered Norries; "I knew it. I might have read it in every line of those letters; I might have seen it in every deed you did; but there was a portion of your previous history, Sir Arthur, which I knew from my connexion with that part of the country, and which when once the machinations were exposed to my view, afforded the key to all. I ask you, Sir Arthur Adelon, whether some six or seven-and-twenty years ago, Mr. Charles Dudley did not carry off from your pursuit, the lady on whom you had fixed your heart?"
Sir Arthur Adelon's usually placid face assumed the expression of a demon; and no longer averting his eyes from the fixed, stern gaze of Norries, he stared full in his face in return, and slowly inclined his head. He said not a word, but that look and that gesture were sufficient reply. They said, more plainly than any words could have spoken, "You have divined it all; you have fathomed the dark secret of my heart to the bottom."
"Well, Sir Arthur," continued Norries, with a softened air, "I can excuse strong passions, for I have them myself, and I know them at times to be irresistible. In your case, I was sure you had been thus moved. I looked upon you as a man devoted to the service of your country; and I thought that, in a case where all other considerations should give place to the interests of my country, it would be wrong to damn for ever the name of one who might do her the best and highest of services. There was but one thing that made me doubt your sincerity."
"You should not doubt it," said Sir Arthur; "I am as sincerely devoted to the service of my country as ever."