“No, no, Ned.”

“You did, Charles; I read it in your eyes.  And so it was that when I wished to leave that which was most precious to me in safe hands I had to pass you over and to place him in the charge of the one man who from the first never doubted my innocence.  Better a thousand times that my son should be brought up in a humble station and in ignorance of his unfortunate father, than that he should learn to share the doubts and suspicions of his equals.”

“Then he is really your son!” cried my uncle, staring at Jim in amazement.

For answer the man stretched out his long withered arm, and placed a gaunt hand upon the shoulder of the actress, whilst she looked up at him with love in her eyes.

“I married, Charles, and I kept it secret from my friends, for I had chosen my wife outside our own circles.  You know the foolish pride which has always been the strongest part of my nature.  I could not bear to avow that which I had done.  It was this neglect upon my part which led to an estrangement between us, and drove her into habits for which it is I who am to blame and not she.  Yet on account of these same habits I took the child from her and gave her an allowance on condition that she did not interfere with it.  I had feared that the boy might receive evil from her, and had never dreamed in my blindness that she might get good from him.  But I have learned in my miserable life, Charles, that there is a power which fashions things for us, though we may strive to thwart it, and that we are in truth driven by an unseen current towards a certain goal, however much we may deceive ourselves into thinking that it is our own sails and oars which are speeding us upon our way.”

My eyes had been upon the face of my uncle as he listened, but now as I turned them from him they fell once more upon the thin, wolfish face of Sir Lothian Hume.  He stood near the window, his grey silhouette thrown up against the square of dusty glass; and I have never seen such a play of evil passions, of anger, of jealousy, of disappointed greed upon a human face before.

“Am I to understand,” said he, in a loud, harsh voice, “that this young man claims to be the heir of the peerage of Avon?”

“He is my lawful son.”

“I knew you fairly well, sir, in our youth; but you will allow me to observe that neither I nor any friend of yours ever heard of a wife or a son.  I defy Sir Charles Tregellis to say that he ever dreamed that there was any heir except myself.”

“I have already explained, Sir Lothian, why I kept my marriage secret.”

“You have explained, sir; but it is for others in another place to say if that explanation is satisfactory.”

Two blazing dark eyes flashed out of the pale haggard face with as strange and sudden an effect as if a stream of light were to beat through the windows of a shattered and ruined house.

“You dare to doubt my word?”