Gaston's eyes were on Lady Belward's portrait. "What did my grandmother say?"
There was a pause, then:
"That she would never call him son again, I believe; that the shadow of his life would be hateful to her always. I tell you this because I see you look at that portrait. What I said, I think, was no less. So, Robert, after a wild burst of anger, flung away from us out of the house. His mother, suddenly repenting, ran to follow him, but fell on the stone steps at the door, and became a cripple for life. At first she remained bitter against Robert, and at that time Ian painted that portrait. It is clever, as you may see, and weird. But there came a time when she kept it as a reproach to herself, not Robert. She is a good woman—a very good woman. I know none better, really no one."
"What became of the arrested man?" Gaston asked quietly, with the oblique suggestiveness of a counsel.
"He died of a broken blood-vessel on the night of the intended rescue, and the matter was hushed up."
"What became of the wife?"
"She died also within a year."
"Were there any children?"
"One—a girl."
"Whose was the child?"