“You think me generous, madam,” said he. “Do not misapprehend me. I am not. I covet neither the title nor estates of Ostermore. Their possession would be a thorn in my flesh, a thorn of bitter memory. That is one reason why you should not think me generous, though it is not the reason why I cede them. I would have you understand me on this, perhaps the last time, that we may meet.
“Lord Ostermore, my father, married you, madam, in good faith.”
She interrupted harshly. “What is't you say?” she almost screamed, quivering with rage at the very thought of what her dead lord had done.
“He married you in good faith,” Mr. Caryll repeated quietly, impressively. “I will make it plain to you. He married you believing that the girl-wife he had left in France was dead. For fear it should come to his father's knowledge, he kept that marriage secret from all. He durst not own his marriage to his father.”
“He was not—as you may have appreciated in the years you lived with him—a man of any profound feeling for others. For himself he had a prodigiously profound feeling, as you may also have gathered. That marriage in France was troublesome. He had come to look upon it as one of his youth's follies—as he, himself, described it to me in this house, little knowing to whom he spoke. When he received the false news of her death—for he did receive such news from the very cousin who crossed from France to avenge her, believing her dead himself—he rejoiced at his near escape from the consequences of his folly. Nor was he ever disabused of his error. For she had ceased to write to him by then. And so he married you, madam, in good faith. That is the argument I shall use with my Lord Carteret to make him understand that respect for my father's memory urges me to depart in silence—save for what I must have said to escape the impeachment with which you threatened me.”
“Lord Carteret is a man of the world. He will understand the far-reaching disturbance that must result from the disclosure of the truth of this affair. He will pledge Mr. Templeton to silence, and the truth, madam, will never be disclosed. That, I think, is all, madam.”
“By God, sir,” cried Rotherby, “that's damned handsome of you!”
“You epitomize it beautifully,” said Mr. Caryll, with a reversion to his habitual manner.
His mother, however, had no words at all. She advanced a step towards Mr. Caryll, put out her hands, and then—portent of portents!—two tears were seen to trickle down her cheeks, playing havoc, ploughing furrows in the paint that overlaid them.
Mr. Caryll stepped forward quickly. The sight of those tears, springing from that dried-up heart—withered by God alone knew what blight—washing their way down those poor bedaubed cheeks, moved him to a keener pity than anything he had ever looked upon. He took her hands, and pressed them a moment, giving way for once to an impulse he could not master.