“Who are the instigators of this foul wrong?” demanded Robert, hotly, hardly heeding the latter part of the chief’s speech.
“That, also, I cannot reveal to you. You doubtless realize they are enemies,” he returned, not at all disturbed by Robert’s passion.
“Well, then, will you tell me the motive which actuates it?”
The chief did not reply at once. He sat absently sipping his coffee for a few minutes; then suddenly waving the pages from the room, he bent toward his guest, and said, in a low tone:
“A person has discovered that you are not the legitimate son of your father—that he was married to another woman before he ever saw your mother. That woman he forsook, believing the marriage only a farce, and wedded your mother. The first marriage has been proved legal, and a friend of the first wife is now on your father’s track, with the rightful son, to make him acknowledge him. They thought there would be less trouble about the matter if you were out of the way, and that is one reason why you are here.”
“It is false, every word of it!” burst in indignant amazement from Robert’s pale and quivering lips, while the perspiration started from every pore.
He arose and paced the floor, in mingled grief, mortification, and rage, at the stain thus cast upon his name—the name which he had always been taught to believe was spotless.
He would not believe it; for did it not blast every hope that he had cherished from his boyhood up to the present time? He could not claim Dora if it were true! He had no right to her; for he had no name to give her. His heart almost withered within him at the thought, and even the chief cast looks of pity upon his white, agonized face, as he sank, with a despairing cry, into a chair and bowed his head upon his hands.
“It is all a base conspiracy!”
“False or true,” resumed the other, “that is what I have been informed is the fact. But that is not the principal reason why you are confined here.”