He shuddered as if with cold, was silent a moment, and then went on:
“I loved Jessie Morton as I have never loved a woman since, not even your mother. I went to Belvidere just because she had once lived there. I met you in the graveyard, and was struck with your eyes, which reminded me of Laura. I never dreamed you were my child, but I was interested in you, and made you a part of the little pencil sketch I drew of the yard. That picture has often excited Alice’s curiosity, for it was hung in my room at home. When you came and I heard you were from Millbank I hid the sketch away, lest you should see it and recognize the place and wonder how I came by it. You see I am telling you everything, and I may as well confess that when Penelope told me you were from Millbank I wished you had never come to us. We usually hate what we have injured, and anything connected with the Irvings has been very distasteful to me, and I could not endure to hear the name.”
“But you would like Roger; he is the best, the noblest of men!” Magdalen exclaimed, so vehemently that her father must have been dull indeed if he had failed to see how strong a hold Roger Irving had on Magdalen’s affections.
He did see it, but could not sympathize with her then, or at once lay aside all his olden prejudice against the Irvings, and it would be long before Magdalen would feel that in her love for Roger she had her father’s cordial sympathy.
“I have no doubt you speak truly,” he said, “and some time, perhaps, I may see him and tell him myself that his mother was pure, and good, and innocent as an angel; but now I wish to talk of something else, to tell you of my former life, so you may know just the kind of father you have found.”
Magdalen would rather not have listened to the story which followed, and which had in it so much of wrong, but there was no alternative. Mr. Grey was resolved upon a full confession, and he made it, and when the recital was finished, he said:
“I have kept nothing from you. I would rather you should know me as I am. I have told you what I could never tell to Alice. She could not bear it; but you are different. Alice leans on me, while something assures me that I can lean on you. I am growing old. I have a heavy burden to bear. I want you to help me; want you to trust me; to love me, if you can. I have sinned greatly against your mother; have helped to make her what she is. But I have tried to be kind to her these many years; and I ask you, her child and mine, to for give all that is past and try to love me, if only ever so little. Will you, Magdalen?”
He held his hands toward her, and Magdalen took them in hers, and by the kisses and tears dropped upon them, Arthur Grey knew that there was a better understanding between himself and Magdalen than had existed an hour ago; that she knew the worst there was to know of him, and would, in time, see and appreciate the better side of his character, and with this he was content, and seemed much like himself, the courtly, polished gentleman, whose attentions were almost lover-like, and who showed in every look and action how thoroughly he believed in and how fast his love and interest was increasing for the beautiful girl who had been so conclusively proved to be his daughter.
CHAPTER XLV.
AT BEECHWOOD.
