CHAPTER XVII
Richard Bransby was breaking. He could not bear much more, and he knew it. He had felt very faint at lunch. Latham would have driven him to his bed, but Latham had been again lunching at Mrs. Hilary’s.
Now he was alone in the library. The room seemed to his tired, tortured mind haunted by Hugh and by trouble.
He looked up at the clock. The boy had been gone just twenty-four hours. Where had he gone? What was he doing? Violet’s boy!
The sick man felt alone and deserted. Helen had scarcely spoken to him all day. Indeed she had stayed in her room until nearly dinner-time, and at dinner she and Latham had almost confined their chat to each other.
He picked up “David Copperfield,” opened it at random—then shook his head and laid it down, still open. He’d read presently; he could not now.
A step at the door was welcome. It was Stephen.
Bransby began abruptly: “Last night, when you saw him off—he protested his innocence to the last?”
“Yes, sir. Oh! yes.”
“Oh! why didn’t he tell me the truth. If he had confessed, I could have found it in my heart to forgive him.”