“Yes, you are startled; you wonder at me, but, Claire, my child, had I gone to the gallows it would have been as a martyr, as a father dying for his son’s crime. Claire, my child, I am an innocent man.”
“Father!”
“Yes,” he cried, “innocent. You never had cause to shrink from me; and while a thousand times you wrung my heart, I said to myself, ‘You must bear it. You cannot retain her love and win your safety by accusing your son.’”
“Father, you rave,” cried Claire. “This hope of escape has made you grasp at poor Fred’s weak self-accusation. You would save yourself at the expense of the life of your own child.”
“Did I accuse him of the murder, Claire?”
“No, not till now; and oh, father, it is monstrous.”
“Did he not accuse himself, stung by conscience after seeing me here?”
“It is not true. He could not have done such a thing.”
“Indeed!” said Denville bitterly; “and yet I saw him leave the bedside, and stand with the jewel-casket in his hand. I say so to you, for I cannot bear it, child. Let them kill me if they will. Let them save my son; but let me, my child, let me go to my grave with the knowledge that you believe me true and innocent, and that I bore all that my son might live.”
“Then you will not denounce him?”