Watching her lovely face, with its look of sweet girl-woman’s sympathy in the deep clear eyes, the man thought it was matter for small wonder that a father had trusted her with his only child.
“Different versions of his story will reach your ears in London, so it is as well that you should know the truth. Leighton’s professional name was Lyon Fenton. His mother was an Italian, and he inherited her southern nature. As an actor, it is hardly too extravagant to say that he took the world by storm. Paris, Florence, Milan, and Vienna idolised him. He was five-and-thirty when he came to London, and there his slight foreign accent was the only impediment to his success. His Romeo, Othello, Shylock, and Hamlet were the constant theme among critics, who almost to a man praised him. But he did not like London and left it after the second year for Italy. On the eve of his marriage with a beautiful young actress who played Juliette to his Romeo, his fiancée eloped with his best friend.”
Muriel was listening with breathless attention, her eyes full of indignation at his last sentence.
“What horrible treachery!”
“Unfortunately no new thing. The girl was duped into believing some base fabrications about Fenton, and impetuously went off with the man who considered nothing so long as he attained his object. Fenton followed them, and a duel was fought, in which he was unfortunately wounded in the hip. His adversary escaped, for Fenton generously fired in the air rather than injure the man who had married the girl he himself loved.
“Here you have the man’s character—erratic, quixotic, impetuous, but noble to the core.
“When the girl discovered her husband’s treachery she poisoned him and herself, leaving a letter for Fenton, entreating his forgiveness. The child Bertie is theirs.”
Muriel drew a long breath, unconscious that tears were trembling on her eyelashes.
“Oh!” she said with feeling, “what a tragedy, and all occasioned by a man’s perfidy. The world has lost a great actor, whose whole life is spoiled. Then Mr. Leighton is not Bertie’s father?”
“He has never married; the man’s nature is not one to change. He must be about five-and-forty now. I knew all this, as I was a personal friend of Fenton, for whom I had the greatest admiration. But when his injury necessitated his leaving the stage, he disappeared, and none of his former friends nor acquaintances ever heard of him. Knowing his sensitive nature, I understood, and did not try to find his whereabouts. From time to time he sent me tidings, but it is quite four years since I heard anything.”