“My dear Mrs Hallam,” he said, “you do us all an injustice. Let us change this conversation. Believe me, I want to help you, your child, and your ruined parents.”
Millicent started at the last words—ruined parents. There her ideas were obscured and wanting in the clearness with which she believed she saw the truth. But even the explanation of this seemed come at last, and there was a scornful look in her eyes as she exclaimed:
“I want no help. I want justice.”
“Then what do you ask of me?” he said coldly, as he felt the impossibility of argument at such a time.
“My husband’s freedom, your apology, and declaration to the whole world that he has been falsely charged. You can do no more. It is impossible to wipe out this disgrace.”
He made a couple of steps towards her, and took her cold hands in his, raised them to his lips with tender reverence, and kissed them.
“Millicent, my child,” he said, with his voice sounding very deep and soft, “do not blame me. My position was forced upon me, and you do not know the sacrifice it has cost me as I thought of you—the sacrifice it will be to Mr Dixon and myself to repair the losses we have sustained.”
She snatched her hands from his, and her eyes flashed with anger.
Her rage was but of a few moments’ duration. Then she had flung herself upon her knees at his feet, and, with clasped hands and streaming eyes, sobbed forth:
“I am mad! I am mad! I don’t know what I say. Sir Gordon—dear Sir Gordon, help us. It is not true. He is innocent. My noble husband could not have descended to such baseness. Sir Gordon, save him! save him!—my poor child’s father—my husband, whom I love so well. You do not answer. You do not heed my words. Is man so cruel, then, to the unfortunate? Can you so treat the girl who reverenced you as a child—the woman you said you loved? Man—man!” she cried passionately, “can you not see that my heart is breaking? and yet you, who by a word could save him, now look on and coldly turn a deaf ear to my prayers. Oh, fool! fool! fool! that I was to think that help could come from man. God, help me now, or else in Thy mercy let me die!”