"I cannot tell you," he resumed, "what I suffered on awakening from the sort of stupor in which this intelligence threw me. You have never known—may God preserve you from ever knowing it!—what that desolation is, when those we love are found unworthy of our love! The anguish and despair which then tore my soul to pieces, I shudder to look back upon. It was not that my love had been destroyed—it was not that which made the pang; it was the horrible, heartless cruelty with which I had been deceived. I had been sacrificed to wealth. That I might have forgiven; but it was done so cruelly! Until she had accepted her husband, her letters were as affectionate and hopeful as ever. The blow was unbroken in its fall—no wonder that it nearly crushed me!"
He paused again; and saw tears glisten in the earnest eyes of his listener. She, too, had known what it was to suffer from hopeless love!
"Violet, I am fierce and brutal in my instincts, and my education had been but indifferent—on one point especially it had been deficient;—in the Christian spirit of forgiveness. Vengeance—the justice of the savage—was what I had never learned to disown. Writhing under the torture which had been inflicted, I took comfort solely in the hope of vengeance. I came to England with that one absorbing object. Now comes the painful part of iny disclosure—if indeed you have not already guessed it—the girl who had ... in a word, it was Mrs. Vyner!"
He expected to see her vehemently startled, but she only whispered, in a hoarse and broken voice,—
"I knew it."
"You knew it! Then have you understood me?"
"Not quite."
"I must explain, then, my conduct further. I was here in England, resolved on reparation of the wrong I had suffered. I knew not what shape my vengeance would take, but I was resolved to have it in some shape or other. I saw you. To know you, was to love you—and I loved. In my love, I forgot my misery, and ceased to think of revenge. You were sometimes cold and haughty to me, Violet; sometimes kind and encouraging. Do you remember when we rode to the sands that afternoon, and sat upon the rock together listening to the sea? I could have told you then how much I loved you, had not your coldness chilled me. Well, on that very day, while I was suffering from your indifference; she, jealous of you, chose to recall me back again to my schemes, by pretending that her marriage had been an act of jealous despair; she roused the demon in me by her infernal arts, and once more I resolved to wreak upon her the vengeance you had made me forget. From that moment I have pursued a scheme which involved her ruin. Many times have I been vacillating, many times has a kind word or look from you brought me back again to a purer atmosphere; but the devil would have it! and a haughty gesture from you has thrown me back again. Hurried onwards by the irresistible course of events, I was nearly losing myself for ever, when last night I had my eyes opened. I saw that the only vengeance worthy of a man was contempt. At once, I resolved to cease feigning love for the miserable being whom I had marked as my victim; resolved to break away from the net in which I was entangled, by quitting England.
"Before I left England, I had only to learn my fate: if you refused me, I should carry my despair into distant lands; if you accepted the offer of a heart, I thought you would not refuse to quit England with me. You have now heard all. I have told you of my crime: if repentance will not clear me from the stain...."
The door was thrown violently open before he could conclude the sentence, and Mrs. Vyner stood before them.