“I scarce know, save from the scraps that I have heard. Her father, it would seem, was Ostermore's friend, and, dying, he appointed Ostermore her guardian. Her fortune, I take it, is very slender. Nevertheless, Ostermore, whatever he may have done by other people, appears in this case to have discharged his trust with zeal and with affection. But, indeed, who could have done other where that sweet lady was concerned? You should see her, Sir Richard!” He was pacing the room now as he spoke, and as he spoke he warmed to his subject more and more. “She is middling tall, of a most dainty slenderness, dark-haired, with a so sweet and saintly beauty of face that it must be seen to be believed. And eyes—Lord! the glory of her eyes! They are eyes that would lead a man into hell and make him believe it heaven,
“'Love doth to her eyes repair
To help him of his blindness.'”
Sir Richard watched him, displeasure growing in his face. “So!” he said at last. “Is that the reason?”
“The reason of what?” quoth Mr. Caryll, recalled from his sweet rapture.
“The reason of these fresh qualms of yours. The reason of all this sympathy for Ostermore; this unwillingness to perform the sacred duty that is yours.”
“Nay—on my soul, you do me wrong!” cried Mr. Caryll indignantly. “If aught had been needed to spur me on, it had been my meeting with this lady. It needed that to make me realize to the bitter full the wrong my Lord Ostermore has done me in getting me; to make me realize that I am a man without a name to offer any woman.”
But Sir Richard, watching him intently, shook his head and fetched a sigh of sorrow and disdain. “Pshaw, Justin! How we befool ourselves! You think it is not so; you try to think it is not so; but to me it is very plain. A woman has arisen in your life, and this woman, seen but once or twice, unknown a week or so ago, suffices to eclipse the memory of your mother and turns your aim in life—the avenging of her bitter wrongs—to water. Oh, Justin, Justin! I had thought you stronger.”
“Your conclusions are all wrong. I swear they are wrong!”
Sir Richard considered him sombrely. “Are you sure—quite, quite sure?”
Mr. Caryll's eyes fell, as the doubt now entered his mind for the first time that it might be indeed as Sir Richard was suggesting. He was not quite sure.