“Have you told her that you love her and no one else?”
“Certainly!”
“Then you have lied to her.”
There was silence—tense silence.
“Do you expect me to strike you for that?” came at last from Frederic's lips, low and menacing.
“You have always considered yourself to be my son, haven't you?” pursued Brood deliberately. “Can you say to me that you have behaved of late as a son should———”
“Wait! We'll settle that point right now. I did lose my head. Head, I say, not heart. I shan't attempt to explain—I can't, for that matter. As for Yvonne—well, she's as good as gold. She understands me far better than I understand myself. She knows that even honest men lose their heads sometimes—and she knows the difference between love and—the other thing. I can say to you now that I would sooner have cut my own throat than do more than envy you the possession of someone you do not deserve. I have considered myself your son. I have no apology to make for my—we'll call it infatuation. I shall only admit that it has existed and that I have despaired. So God is my witness, I have never loved anyone but Lydia. I have given her pain, and the amazing part of it is that I can't help myself. Naturally, you can't understand what it all means. You are not a young man any longer. You cannot understand.”
“Good God!” burst from Brood's lips. Then he laughed aloud—grotesquely.
“Yvonne is the most wonderful thing that has ever come into my life. She has shown me that life is beautiful and rich and full of warmth. I had always thought it ugly and cold. Something inside of me awoke the instant I looked into her eyes—something that had always been there, and yet undeveloped. She spoke to me with her eyes, if you can believe such a thing possible, and I understood. I adored her the instant I saw her. I have felt sometimes that I knew her a thousand years ago. I have felt that I loved her a thousand years ago.” A calm seriousness now attended his speech, in direct contrast to the violent mood that had gone before. “I have thought of little else but her. I confess it to you. But through it all there has never been an instant in which I did not worship Lydia Desmond. I—I do not pretend to account for it. It is beyond me.”
Brood waited patiently to the end.