Mrs. Ritson sat down and Paul put his hand tenderly on her head.
"Better that than to have it wrested from me inch by inch—to hold the shadow of an inheritance while he grasps the substance. He knows all. His dark hints are not needed to tell me that."
"Yet he is silent," said Mrs. Ritson, and her eyes fell on to her book. "And surely it is for my sake that he is so—if in truth he knows all. Is he not my son? And is not my honor his honor?"
Paul shook his head.
"If the honor of twenty mothers, as true and dear as you, were the stepping-stones to his interest, over those stones he would go. No, no; it is not honor, whether yours or his, that keeps him silent."
Mrs. Ritson glanced up.
"Are you not too hard on him? He is guiltless in the eye of the world, and that at least should plead for him. Forgive him. Do not leave your brother in anger!"
"I have nothing to forgive," said Paul. "Even if he knew nothing, I should still go away and leave everything. I could not live any longer under the shadow of this secret, bound by an oath. I would go, as I go now, with sealed lips, but a free heart. He should have his own before man—and I mine, before God."
Mrs. Ritson sat in silence; her lips trembled perceptibly, and her eyelids quivered.
"I shall soon leave you, my dear son," she said in a tremulous voice.