What would happen! If Emmy lost her courage, or if her better nature, attenuated as it was, conquered her spite, the situation might still be saved. Lord Barnstaple would be only too willing to receive the assurance that the man, insulted to fury, had lied; and, above all, Cecil need never know. There was no doubt that Lord Barnstaple’s deserts were largely of his own invoking, but she set her nails into her palms with a fierce maternal yearning over Cecil. He was blameless, and he was hers. One way or another he should be spared.
She waited for Lord Barnstaple’s return until she could wait no longer. If he were not still with Emmy—and it was not likely that he would prolong the interview—he must have gone to his rooms by the upper corridors. She went rapidly out of the drawing-room and up the stair. She could not be regarded as an intruder and she must know the worst to-night. What would Lord Barnstaple do if Emmy had confessed the truth? She tried to persuade herself that she had not the least idea.
CHAPTER XXV
HE was sitting at his desk writing; and as he lifted his hand at her abrupt entrance and laid it on an object beside his papers she received no shock of surprise. She went forward and lifted his hand from the revolver.
“Must you?” she asked.
“Of course I must. Do you think I could live with myself another day?”
“Perhaps no one need ever know.”
“Everybody in England will know before a week is over. She gave me to understand that people guessed it already.”
“This seems such a terrible alternative to a woman—but——”
“But you have race in you. You understand perfectly. My honour has been sold, and my pride is dead: there is no place among men for what is left of me. And to face my son again! Good God!”