"Yes, my lord," continued Richard: "I see that I have hitherto been speaking in enigmas. But I will now explain myself better. It is of one whom you knew as Harriet Wilmot that I require explanations at your hands."
"Harriet Wilmot!—yes—I knew her," said the Marquis, faintly: "I did her grievous wrong! and yet——"
"Your lordship will understand wherefore I feel interested in all that relates to Harriet Wilmot," interrupted Markham,—"when I declare to you that she was secretly married to my own father—and it is her child whom I yesterday embraced as a sister!"
"As there is a God in heaven, my lord," exclaimed the Marquis of Holmesford, emphatically, "I never until this moment knew the name of Harriet's husband; and with equal solemnity would I assert on my death-bed that she was innocent, my lord—she was innocent!"
"Oh! if I could believe—if I were assured——"
Richard could say no more: he pressed his hand to his brow, as if to steady his brain and collect his thoughts; and tears trembled on his long black lashes.
"Prince of Montoni," cried the Marquis, rising from his seat, and speaking with more sincerity and more seriousness than had characterised his tone for many, many years; "I am a man of pleasure, I admit—a man of gallantry, I allow; but I have no inclination to gratify, no interest to serve, by uttering a falsehood now. Again I declare to you—as God is my judge—that Harriet was innocent in respect to myself,—and I believe—nay, I would venture to assert—innocent also with regard to others—and faithful to her husband!"
"My lord," said Richard, in a voice tremulous with mingled emotions of joy and doubt; and as he spoke, he also rose from his seat, and took the nobleman's hand, which he pressed with nervous force,—"my lord, prove to me what you have just stated—explain all that took place between yourself and Harriet on that night which appears to have been so fatal to her happiness,—show me, in a word, that she was innocent,—and I will banish from my mind all angry feelings which may have been excited by the knowledge of your intrigues to undermine her virtue!"
"I cannot for a moment, hesitate to satisfy you in this respect," said the Marquis. "Resume your seat, my lord—and I will narrate, as calmly and distinctly as I can, all that transpired on the night when she was inveigled to my house;—for I perceive that you are well acquainted with many details concerning her."
"It is but right to inform you," observed Richard, "that the old woman who aided your designs with regard to her whom I must consider to have been my step-mother, has committed to paper a narrative of all which she knew relative to that unfortunate young woman. But there is one gap which your lordship must fill up—one mystery which is as yet unrevealed. I allude to the incidents of that fatal night, when, even if Harriet escaped innocent from this house, she, by some strange combination of untoward circumstances, lost the confidence of my father—her husband—and appeared guilty in his eyes."