“But the evidence is all here,” said Mr. Scarborough, laying his hand on a small bundle of papers.  “The difficulty would have been, and the danger, in causing Mountjoy to have been accepted in his brother’s place.  There can be no doubt that I was not married till after Mountjoy was born.”

Mr. Grey’s curiosity was roused, and he began to ask questions.  Why, in the first place, had Mr. Scarborough behaved so dishonestly?  Why had he originally not married his wife?  And then, why had he married her?  If, as he said, the proofs were so easy, how had he dared to act so directly in opposition to the laws of his country?  Why, indeed, had he been through the whole of his life so bad a man,—­so bad to the woman who had borne his name, so bad to the son whom he called illegitimate, and so bad also to the other son whom he now intended to restore to his position, solely with the view of defrauding the captain’s creditors?

In answer to this Mr. Scarborough, though he was suffering much at the time,—­so much as to be considered near to his death,—­had replied with the most perfect good-humor.

He had done very well, he thought, by his wife, whom he had married after she had consented to live with him on other terms.  He had done very well by his elder son, for whom he had intended the entire property.  He had done well by his second son, for whom he had saved his money.  It was now his first duty to save the property.  He regarded himself as being altogether unselfish and virtuous from his point of view.

When Mr. Grey had spoken about the laws of his country he had simply smiled, though he was expecting a grievous operation on the following day.  As for marriage, he had no great respect for it, except as a mode of enabling men and women to live together comfortably.  As for the “outraged laws of his country,” of which Mr. Grey spoke much, he did not care a straw for such outrages—­nor, indeed, for the expressed opinion of mankind as to his conduct.  He was very soon about to leave the world, and meant to do the best he could for his son Augustus.  The other son was past all hope.  He was hardly angry with his eldest son, who had undoubtedly given him cause for just anger.  His apparent motives in telling the truth about him at last were rather those of defrauding the Jews, who had expressed themselves to him with brutal audacity, than that of punishing the one son or doing justice to the other; but even of them he spoke with a cynical good-humor, triumphing in his idea of thoroughly getting the better of them.

“I am consoled, Mr. Grey,” he said, “when I think how probably it might all have been discovered after my death.  I should have destroyed all these,” and he laid his hands upon the papers, “but still there might have been discovery.”

Mr. Grey could not but think that during the last twenty-four years,—­the period which had elapsed since the birth of the younger son,—­no idea of such a truth had occurred to himself.