“Will you hear the whole story?” he said. He felt that it would be best to tell them all. “Can it do any good?” asked Sir William. He looked towards his wife.
“Perhaps it is better to hear it,” she murmured. She was clinging to a vague hope.
Gaston told the story plainly, briefly, as he had told his earlier history. Its concision and simplicity were poignant. From the day he first saw Andree in the justice’s room till the hour when she opened Ian Belward’s letter, his tale went. Then he paused.
“I remember very well,” Sir William said, with painful meditation: “a strange girl, with a remarkable face. You pleaded for her father then. Ah, yes, an unhappy case!”
“There is more?” asked Lady Belward, leaning on her cane. She seemed very frail.
Then with a terrible brevity Gaston told them of his uncle, of the letter to Andree: all, except that Andree was his wife. He had no idea of sparing Ian Belward now. A groan escaped Lady Belward.
“And now—now, what will you do?” asked the baronet.
“I do not know. I am going back first to Andree.” Sir William’s face was ashy.
“Impossible!”
“I promised, and I will go back.” Lady Belward’s voice quivered: