The company turned with one accord and beheld a tall youth, attired in tweeds, march confidently into the room. In fact, he seemed so much at home, that, though naturally surprised (especially at his unorthodox costume), they never dreamt of any but the most obvious and simple explanation. They scrutinized him as he advanced, merely wondering what cousin—or could it be brother?—he was.
"Surely that's not Frank?" murmured Lord Kilconquar.
It certainly was not Frank; and yet it was some one who looked strangely familiar to one or two of the older people present. He made straight for Andrew, his hand outstretched.
"Don't you know me?" he asked; and the voice recalled strange memories too.
Andrew was not altogether unprepared for some such apparition appearing some day, though scarcely on such a horribly ill-timed occasion. Somehow, he had always imagined the dread possibility as happening in his office. But he remembered exactly how he had decided to confront it. He pulled his lip hard down, his eyes contracted dangerously, and then he merely shook his head.
"What!" cried the young man, with a touching note of rebuffed affection. "Don't you recognize your own son?"
Andrew's brain reeled. His mouth fell open, and his stare lost all traces of formidableness.
"Father!" said the stranger in a moving voice.
Incoherently Andrew burst out.
"You—you—you're not my son!"