“Proceed, madam: I will not again interrupt you unnecessarily,” said the young man.
“Well, then, my lord—I fancied that it was a flagrant shame and an abhorrent cruelty thus to retain you in ignorance, as I supposed, of your true standing in the world; and a sense of justice determined me—although a total stranger to you—to acquaint your lordship with those facts which, it however appears, were already well known to you.”
“To speak candidly, my dear madam,” said Charles, “I was in complete ignorance of all those circumstances until eight or ten days ago, when they were revealed to me by the strangest accident in the world.”
“May I, without appearing indiscreet, enquire the nature of the accident that thus put your lordship in possession of such important—such vitally important facts?”
“Assuredly, my dear madam,” returned Charles Hatfield. “You yourself have behaved to me with so much kindness and candour in this respect, that I owe you my entire confidence. A mere chance threw in my way certain papers which fully prove that Octavia Manners was the wife of the late Earl of Ellingham when their child was born; and that my own father, who now bears the name of Hatfield, but who was so long and so unhappily known by that of Rainford, was the child to whom allusion is made.”
“And those papers—have you them in your possession?” asked Mrs. Fitzhardinge.
“I have—carefully concealed in a private compartment of my writing-desk, in my own chamber at Lord Ellingham’s mansion.”
“But has your lordship no hesitation in proclaiming your rights and titles—or rather in acquiring them by forcing your father to proclaim his own?” demanded the old woman, again fixing her eyes steadfastly upon his countenance.
“Ah! there, madam, you touch the wound in my heart!” exclaimed Charles, the sudden workings of his countenance displaying the anguish which the thought excited within him. “I am loth to take the grand—the important—the irrevocable step on the one hand; and I cannot bear to surrender up all my privileges on the other. Moreover, my parents have not acted towards me in a way to render necessary every sacrifice on my part;—and even this morning—this very morning—my father added a new injury to the list of those already committed against me—a new wrong, by upbraiding me, under particular circumstances, with harshness—even brutality.”
“Certainly your lordship cannot permit a false sense of filial duty to mar all the golden prospects which open before you!” exclaimed the vile woman, who was thus encouraging evil thoughts in the young man’s mind. “Consider your youth—your handsome appearance—your great talents—the brilliant hopes which develop themselves in the horizon of the future——”