"God knows I did; but that does not alter the fact of my consequent crime."
He looked again at Champney as he spoke out his conviction, and his own emotion suffered a check in his amazement at the change in the countenance before him. He had seen nothing like this in the thirty-two hours he had been in his presence; his jaw was set; his nostrils white and sharpened; the pupils of his eyes contracted to pin points; and into the sallow cheeks, up to the forehead knotted as with intense pain, into the sunken temples, the blood rushed with a force that threatened physical disaster, only to recede as quickly, leaving the face ghastly white, the eyelids twitching, the muscles about the mouth quivering.
Noting all this Father Honoré read deeper still; he knew that Champney Googe had not told him the whole, possibly not the half—and never would tell. His next question convinced him of that.
"May I ask what became of the young girl you loved?—Don't answer, if I am asking too much."
"I don't know. I have never heard from her. I can only surmise. But I did receive a letter from her when I was in prison, before my trial—she was summoned as witness; and oh, the infinite mercy of a loving woman's heart!" He was silent a moment.
"She took so much blame upon herself, telling me that she had not known her own heart; that she tried to think she loved me as a brother; that she had been willing to let it go on so, and because she had not been brave enough to be honest with herself, all this trouble had come upon me whom she acknowledged she loved—upon her and her household. She begged me, if acquitted, never to see her, never to communicate with her again. There was but one duty for us both she said, guilty as we both were of what had occurred to wreck a human being for life; to go each the way apart forever—I mine, she hers—to expiate in good works, in loving kindness to those who might need our help....
"I have never known anything further—heard no word—made no inquiry. At that time, after my acquittal, my great-uncle, a well-to-do baker, settled a sum of money on the man who had been in his employ; the interest of it would support him in his incapacity to do a man's work and earn a decent livelihood. My uncle said then I was never again to darken his doors. He desired me to leave no address; to keep secret to myself my destination, and forever after my whereabouts. I obeyed to the letter—now enough of myself. I have told you this because, as a man, I had not the face to sit here in your presence and hear your decision, without showing you my respect for your courage—and I have taken this way to show it."
He held out his hand and Champney wrung it. "You don't know all, or you would have no respect," he said brokenly.
The two men looked understandingly into each other's eyes, but they both felt intuitively that any prolongation of this unwonted emotional strain would be injurious to both, and the work in hand. They, at once, in tacit understanding of each other's condition, put aside "the things that were behind" and "reached forth to those that were before": they laid plans for the speedy execution of all that Champney's decision involved.
"There is one thing I cannot do," he spoke with decision; "that is to see my mother before my commitment—or after. It is the only thing that will break me down. I need all the strength of control I possess to go through this thing."