But her blood was up—gentle, yielding, timid, she had yet a spirit of her own, and her share of British "pluck."
She faced her accuser like a small, fair-haired lioness, her eyes flashing blue fire.
"I do deny it! You wretch, how dare you come here with such a lie!" She turned her back upon him with a scorn under which even he winced. "Victor!" she cried, lifting her clasped hands to her husband, "hear me and forgive me if you can. I have done wrong—wrong—but I—I was afraid, and I thought he was drowned. I wanted to tell you all—I did, indeed, but papa and mamma were afraid—afraid of losing you, Victor. I told you a falsehood about the photograph—he, that wretch, did give it to me, and—" her face drooped with a bitter sob—"he was my lover then, years ago, in Scotland."
"Ah!" quoted Mr. Catheron, "truth is mighty and will prevail! Tell it,
Ethel; the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."
"Silence, sir!" Lady Catheron cried, "and don't dare call me Ethel. I was only fifteen, Victor—think of it, a child of fifteen, spending my holidays in Glasgow when I met him. And he dared to make love to me. It amused him for the time—representing himself as a sort of banished prince, a nobleman in disguise. He took my silly, girlish fancy for the time. What did I at fifteen know of love? The day I was to return home, we exchanged pictures and rings, and he took me out for a last walk. He led me into a solitary chapel, and made me join hands, and pledge myself to be his wife. There was not a soul in the place but ourselves. As we left it we met papa. We shook hands and parted, and until this hour I have never since set eyes on his face. Victor, don't blame me too much—think what a child I was—remember I was afraid of him. The instant he was out of my sight I disliked him. He wrote to me—I never answered his letters, except once, and then it was to return his, and tell him to trouble me no more. That is all. O Victor! don't look like that! I am sorry—I am sorry. Forgive me or I shall die."
He was ashen white, but there was a dignity about him that awed into silence even the easy assurance of Juan Catheron. He stooped and kissed the tear-wet, passionate, pleading face.
"I believe you," he said; "your only fault was in not telling me long ago. Don't cry, and sit down."
He placed her in a chair, walked over, and confronted his cousin.
"Juan Catheron," he said, "you are a slanderer and a scoundrel, as you always were. Leave this house, and never, whilst I live, set your foot across its threshold. Five years ago you committed a forgery of my name for three thousand pounds. I turned you out of Catheron Royals and let you go. I hold that forged check yet. Enter this house again, repeat your infamous lie, and you shall rot in Chesholm jail! I spared you then for your sister's sake—for the name you bear and disgrace—but come here again and defame my wife, and I'll transport you though you were my brother. Now go, and never come back."
He walked to the door and flung it wide. Juan Catheron stood and looked at him, his admirable good-humor unruffled, something like genuine admiration in his face.