“Mr. Aytoun,” said Anne, with nervous firmness, “we have no systematic proof to lay before you. Anything which can directly meet and overcome the evidence of which you speak, remains still to be gathered—and it is possible, that this, on which we build our hopes, may seem but a very feeble foundation to you. In law, I suppose, it could have no weight for a moment: but yet to those who knew my brother Norman, and were acquainted with his peculiar temperament and nature, it carries absolute conviction.—I scarcely hope that it can have the same power of convincing you—but I pray you to receive as certainly true, before I read this, the judgment which all his friends pronounced upon my unhappy brother, before this dishonor came upon him. They call him the most truthful and generous of men: they distinguish him for these two qualities above all his compeers. Mrs. Catherine, I speak truly?”
“Truthful as the course of nature itself, which the Almighty keeps from varying. Generous as the sun that He hath set to shine upon the just and the unjust. Do not linger, Anne: read Norman’s letter.”
Anne lifted the letter, and glanced up at James before she began to read—his eyes were fixed upon her, his face was full of grave anxiety—convinced or unconvinced, she was sure at least of an attentive listener. She began to read—her voice trembling at first, as the quick throbbings of her heart almost choked it, but becoming hysterically strong, as she went on; her mind agitated as Norman’s was when he wrote that letter, eager like him, by what repetitions or incoherent words soever, that were strongest and most suitable for the urgent purpose, to throw off the terrible accusation under which he lay: it was like no second party reading an old letter; it was the very voice and cry of one pleading for life—for more than life—for lost good fame and honor.
James Aytoun’s eyes were steadily fixed upon her; and as she closed the letter, her whole frame vibrating, he drew a long breath—that most grateful of all sounds to the ears of a speaker who desires to move and impress his audience. Anne looked up eagerly and anxious. He had covered his face with his hand. Neither of them spoke; until, at last, James raised his head:
“May I see that letter, Miss Ross? Can you give it me?”
Anne had omitted the sentence in which Norman mentioned his escape. She folded it in, and handed him the letter. He read it again carefully, and yet again. Besides the earnest agony of its words, there was a mute eloquence about that yellow, timeworn paper. Blisters of tears were on it: tears of terrible grief—tears of tremulous hope. Its very characters, abrupt and broken as they were, spoke as with a living voice. Nothing false—nothing feigned, could be in the desperate energy of that wild cry, the burden of Norman’s self-defence: “I am innocent! I am innocent!”
“Miss Ross,” said James Aytoun, “there never was man convicted from clearer evidence than that which has persuaded the world of your brother’s guilt. I cannot comprehend it—my faith is shaken. I confess to you, that I feel this letter to be true—that I can no longer think of him as the murderer.”
Anne tried to smile—she could not. A stranger—a man prejudiced against Norman—the son of the dead. The tears came over her cheeks in a burst of joy. She thought it the voice of universal acquittal: she forgot all the difficulties that remained—Norman was saved.
The library-door opened, and Lewis entered. Mrs. Catherine rose, and presented him to James: the two young men shook hands with an involuntary cordiality, at which they were themselves astonished. Anne was conquering herself again; but joy seemed so much more difficult to keep in bounds, and restrain, than sorrow was. She had little experience of the first—much of the other. She started up, and laid her hand on Lewis’s arm.
“Lewis, Lewis! the way is clearing before us. Mr. Aytoun gives us his support. Mr. Aytoun thinks him innocent!”