“Thank God!” cried Charles, fervently.
“Is it possible that you still love your mother?” demanded Mr. Hatfield, whose countenance brightened up in the faintest degree, but in a manner as sickly as if the gleam of a dying lamp fell upon the rigid features of a corpse.
“Is it possible that you can ask me the question?” exclaimed the young man. “Oh! you know that I love my mother—my dear mother,” he repeated, as a thousand proofs of her affection for him suddenly rose up in his mind—rapidly as the spell of an enchanter might cause flowers to appear upon the surface of a stern and arid waste. “And you, my father,” he continued, taking his parent’s hand, and pressing it to his lips, “I love you also—in spite of what you may suppose to be my disobedient conduct!”
“No—no—you love me not!” exclaimed Mr. Hatfield, hastily withdrawing his hand which for a few moments he had abandoned to his son: “else never would you have acted thus. But tell me, Charles—tell me,—for I did not condescend to question your flippant French servant,—tell me—have I come too late to save you?—are you married to that young woman——”
“If you mean, father, whether Perdita Fitzhardinge is now my wife,” began Charles, drawing himself up proudly, and speaking in a resolute—almost indignant tone,—“I——”
“Perdita Fitzhardinge!” repeated the unhappy man, staggering as if from a sudden blow dealt by an invisible hand: “oh! then ’tis indeed she—and all my worst fears are confirmed! Villiers was right—and those officers were right also!”
“What mean you, father!” demanded Charles, now seriously alarmed—though knowing not what to think. “You speak of a young lady of ravishing beauty—elegant manners—spotless character——”
“Charles Hatfield, is she your wife?” asked the parent, now advancing close up to the young man, and pressing his arm so violently with the strong spasm which convulsed his fingers that Charles winced and almost cried out through the pain inflicted; for his arm felt as if it were grasped by fingers of iron!
“Yes, father—I am proud to inform you,” he said, again assuming an air of noble independence,—“I am proud to inform you——”
“Fool—madman—senseless idiot!” exclaimed Mr. Hatfield, his rage suddenly bursting forth with such volcanic fury that his son fell back in terror and dismay and eyed his father as if he thought that he must be insane: “you know not what you have done—the misery, the wretchedness you have prepared for yourself—the ashes you are heaping upon your own head—the infamy and disgrace you have brought down upon yourself and all connected with you——”