"This unhappy misunderstanding has been the one blot upon our love," Penlyn said; "if I can help it, there shall never be another."
As he spoke these words, Sir Paul put his hand kindly on his shoulder, and Penlyn knew that, in him, he had one who would faithfully carry his message of love to the woman who was the hope of his life.
"And now," Sir Paul said, "I want you to give me full particulars of everything that has occurred since that miserable night. I want to know everything fully, and from your lips. What Ida has been able to tell me has been sadly incoherent."
Then, once more--as he had had now so often to go over the sad history to others, with but little fresh information added to each recital--Lord Penlyn told Sir Paul everything that he knew, and of the strange manner in which the Señor Guffanta had come into the matter, as well as his apparent certainty of eventually finding the murderer.
"You do not think it is a bold ruse to throw off suspicion from himself?" Sir Paul asked. "A daring man, such as he seems to be, might adopt such a plan."
"No," the other answered, "I do not. There is something about the man, stranger as he is, that not only makes me feel certain that he is perfectly truthful in what he says, and that he really does possess some strange knowledge of the assassin that will enable him to find that man at last, but also makes the others feel equally certain."
"They all believe in him, you say?" Sir Paul asked thoughtfully.
"All! That is, all but Philip Smerdon, who is the only one who has not seen him. And I am sure that, if he too saw him and heard him, he would believe."
"Philip Smerdon is a thorough man of the world," Sir Paul said, "I should be inclined to give weight to his judgment."
"I am sure that he is wrong in this case, and that when he sees Guffanta, he will acknowledge himself to be so. No one who has seen him can doubt his earnestness."