I felt a savage joy in saying this, for at that moment I cared for nothing.
"You will not fight as a man should," I went on. "When it comes to open blows you run away like a coward. You prefer plot and intrigue, and lies in the dark."
"It cannot be said that you are guiltless of plot and intrigue, either," remarked Uncle Anthony quietly.
"I have been obliged to use my enemies' weapons," I replied; "but I have betrayed no man, no woman. I have sought to hurt no man. Nay, I have ever tried to befriend rather than to harm."
"I know more about you than you think," remarked Uncle Anthony; "and at one time I should have been sorely disturbed at doing you harm, so much did I believe in you. It is little use deploring the inevitable. I am too old a man to give up because of one failure, or to cry out because God seemeth against me. But why did you interfere, Roger Trevanion? You, the gay spendthrift—you, who have cared but little for aught save your gaming and your revelries. Why did you not live your life, and let others deal with matters of serious import? Religion is naught to you. It is everything to some of us."
"Because the society of a pure woman made me ashamed of myself," I cried; "because she made me remember my name, my race, and my duty to my country and to God."
The old man sighed, while Otho spoke apart with two or three of the men.
"Methinks I had better have killed you this very evening," he said; "my hand was on the trigger of my pistol."
"When we met?"