“I have no choice; your looks, your acts all compel me to——”
“I cannot help them—when I am near you I forget everything but that I love you!” he pleaded in excuse.
“Shame! Where is your sense of honor, that you persist in such language to the affianced of another?” she panted.
“Twice you have thrown that in my teeth,” he retorted, fiercely, and fast losing control of himself. “Have you no shame, that you confess yourself the affianced of a nameless outcast?”
“He is not nameless, and you have no authority for calling him an outcast,” retorted Gladys, proudly, all her spirit rising to arms at this attack upon her absent lover.
“Haven’t I?” sneered the hot-headed young man. “Listen. I have been looking up Geoffrey Dale’s pedigree, since I saw you last. I have traced him to his birthplace. His mother was a poor, but beautiful girl, without a home, without friends. She had a rich lover, who could not marry her without sacrificing a fortune, and he loved his money too well to do that, so he sacrificed the girl instead. He took her to a remote mining district, where, hidden away from every one who ever knew her, she lived with him for one short year, and died when her child was only a month old. That child was Geoffrey Dale; his mother’s name was Annie Dale, and he has no right to any other, except the one that has been given him for charity’s sake. You have a right to be proud of your betrothed, Miss Huntress.”
“I am proud of him!” Gladys returned, in a firm, even tone. Astonishment at Everet Mapleson knowing so much about Geoffrey had contributed more toward calming her excited nerves than almost anything else could have done. “Yes, I am proud of him,” she repeated, with a change of emphasis, “and you have told me nothing new, Mr. Mapleson. excepting that this young girl had no home or friends, and that the man who took her to New Mexico was rich, and willfully wronged her. Indeed, I know even more than you have told me.”
“More! Do you know who his father was?” Everet Mapleson exclaimed, with a start.
“No, nor do I wish to, if he was guilty of the atrocious act you have named,” Gladys returned, with withering scorn, “But the sin will some day recoil upon his own head: it can never change my regard for one who is innately noble and true.”
“And you do not shrink from becoming the wife of one upon whom shame has rested from the hour of his birth?” demanded Everet Mapleson, regarding the beautiful girl with astonishment.