“There you are again, wanting to shoot me,” Hal exclaimed, “and I deserve it, and wouldn’t mind much, if it were not for Kitty and the baby. I couldn’t say ‘Our Father’ with her to save my life, but she said it with her head bowed and the fading light falling upon the sheen of her fair hair. Now you are going to kill me!” and Hal sprang from his chair as Kenneth raised his right hand.
“For Heaven’s sake throw that thing out of the window, if you want me to keep my senses.”
“Sit down, and don’t be a coward as well as a knave. I shall not kill you till your story is ended. Go on. You made her think she was your wife?”
“Yes,” Hal answered, returning to his chair and beginning to mix a cocktail, which he took down at one gulp. “Must brace my nerves,” he said. “Yes, I made her believe it was lawful, and bound her to secrecy till I came to claim her. I left the next morning and have never seen her since. I found Tom in Paris with Kitty, who was so pretty and piquant and full of life that I began to compare her with Connie, to whom I meant to be faithful, and probably should have been but for a rumor which came from her aunt’s banker that she had lost all her money and was dependent upon her aunt. I took some pains to verify the truth of the report, with a result that I believed it, and then came the tug between Connie with nothing and Kitty with thousands. Kitty won, and I at once wrote to Connie confessing the truth, even to my real name, and that I was your cousin. I called myself a liar, a blackguard, a villain, and if you can think of any worse name I called myself that. I hinted, too, that Kitty was very much in love with me, that her brother knew it, and that with his Kentucky blood I feared what he might do if I left her. In short, I wrote so pathetic a letter that it actually drew tears to my eyes as I read it, and pitied myself for being between two fires, or loves. I loved Connie, I loved Kitty, who was on the ground and won. Why my letter never reached Connie, I don’t know. I sent it to Interlaken, but she must have left before it reached her. Probably it was forwarded from one post to another and was finally lost, as letters not infrequently are on the Continent. When I was married I had a paper sent to her through her aunt’s banker in Paris. I named our baby for her, and though I love Kitty dearly, there is not a day of my life that I do not think of Connie. It was a shock when I heard she was here; but as Kitty wrote how fond they were of each other, and how Connie took to the baby, I concluded she had forgiven me, and was rather anxious to see her again. I hear that her money, instead of being lost, has increased until she is really an heiress, while Kitty’s father has lost everything. Serves me right, though the Lord only knows how I am ever to pay my debts. Their name is legion. Perhaps you’d better shoot me and put me out of my trouble. I’ve told you the truth. I have repented in sackcloth and ashes of that episode in Switzerland. I have even been on my knees before my Creator, and what more can I do?”
Kenneth came near smiling at this assertion, which was so like Harry, and his hand relaxed its hold on the revolver. In his bitter anger he had scarcely noticed Harry’s personal appearance, but he could see now how changed he was. His face was flushed and thin, and there were dark hollows about his eyes, telling of ill-health or dissipation, or both. But he was still too indignant to ask any questions, and he had seen a red parasol at the gate, and knew Kitty had returned with the baby. In a moment she was in the room, bright and breezy, delighted to see Kenneth and solicitous about her husband, whose hair she smoothed as she asked if he had had any breakfast.
“He is a little lazy this morning,” she said to Kenneth. “Baby had colic last night and kept him awake, and then I don’t think he looks quite well, do you? He is positively feverish,” and she took one of his hands in hers and began to rub it. “Grippe, maybe. Please give him something and feel his pulse. How fast it beats.”
“I am glad I didn’t kill him,” Kenneth thought, as he watched her and saw her anxiety for her husband.
He had slipped the revolver into his pocket, but he could not then touch Hal’s hand to count his pulse, and Hal understood it, and, gently pushing Kitty aside, mixed himself some brandy and water, saying, as he drank it:
“Never mind, Kitty. I don’t need medicine; this is better.”
Suddenly it occurred to Kitty to ask if Kenneth were not surprised to find Connie gone.