"And her own boy--ha! _was_ it a _boy_?" he asked, suddenly.

"It was."

"He was taken home by my--by--Lord Lester?"

"Yes."

"Have they had no children since, woman?"

"None, ever, save him who was born beneath the roof of 'Hurtel of the Red-Hand.'"

"And this infant--this b.a.s.t.a.r.d child--this lowborn boy, grew up within the halls of Castle More as its liege lord?"

"He did!"

"And that boy stands before you?"

"He does!"

His calmness was appalling to witness. She shrunk from looking him in the face, and cowered before the light of his eyes.

"Mysterious woman! how thou camest by the knowledge of these things I know not. I believe thou hast spoken truth; thy tale hangs too well together for malice to invent."

He struggled with strong emotion. His brow darkened, his face worked convulsively. At last he seemed to have resolved on a settled purpose.

"Who knows this h.e.l.lish secret besides thyself?" he asked, his penetrating glance resting on her face.

"None but thee," she said, meeting his eye with a wary look, as if antic.i.p.ating danger from the tone of his voice.

"To every human eye, then, but _thine_, I am Lord of Lester?"

"Who of mortal mould should suspect thee to be other than he, when she who bore thee not believes thee to be the fruit of her womb."

"Thou wilt swear this?"

"I say it."

"'Tis enough. Does this fisher's boy know the secret of his birth?"

"No!"

"Does the old man?"

"No!"

"Thou wilt swear it?"

"I say it."

"'Tis well, woman! Thou shalt die!"

As he spoke he drew from his breast his hunting knife and sprang upon her. She detected the momentary lighting up of his eye ere he made the spring, and alertly avoided the blow by leaping through the door: he fell forward, and the blade shivered against the stone sides of the tower.

With a laugh of derision she fled along the pa.s.sage pursued by him. Her voice and also her footsteps ceased as he reached the steps leading upward from the tomb, and, without any sound to guide him, he groped his way along the gallery. At length he approached the light; but, although he could see through the door out into the forest, she was nowhere visible! After vainly searching every part of the ruin, he abandoned the attempt, remounted his horse, and spurred towards Castle More.

CHAPTER V.

"Oh G.o.d! how changed my nature with all this!

I, that had been all love and tenderness-- The truest and most gentle heart till now That ever beat--grew suddenly a devil!"

_Lord Ivan and his Daughter._

What pen can portray, what language describe the feelings of the haughty Lester, as he rode at furious speed towards Castle More? He could neither think nor reflect! His thoughts were confused and tempestuous.

He could not realize that he had actually listened to the accursed tale with his own ears. He felt rather as if he had pa.s.sed through some dreadful dream, and the idea flashed on his mind that she had thrown a dark spell upon his senses, and that the whole was an illusion, and altogether the result of her art.

By degrees his thoughts became more settled and run in a direct channel.

He checked his headlong speed and began to reflect: to recall, word by word, the narrative of Elpsy; weigh each sentence; match fact with fact; each circ.u.mstance with its fellow; and trace the unbroken thread to the last d.a.m.ning proof. The result was irresistible. A thousand circ.u.mstances to corroborate the tale of infamy rose like phantoms to his shrinking memory.

He remembered how, in childhood, a neighbouring baron, who had been out against the insurgents, playfully laid his hand upon his head, and told him he looked so much like Hurtel of the Red-Hand that he must take good care, when he became a man, he did not lose his head for the likeness: he remembered, too, how his childish spirit took fire at the similitude, and that he resented the insult with a blow! He further called to mind how, later in life, the more aged country people, in pa.s.sing him, would shake their heads significantly; and often the whispered words, "Hurtel of the Red-Hand," would reach his ears. He recollected, also, how Lady Lester (alas! no longer, if this tale were proved true, to be regarded as his mother, yet whom he had loved hitherto with the intensest filial affection) had reproved him in his angry moods, and forbade him to frown so like Hurtel of the Red-Hand. He called to mind, too, how that, in childhood (unthought of again till too faithful memory brought it back), it had more than once reached his ears through the menials, that Lady Lester, in her youthful days, had been made a prisoner in some old castle by a rebel chief; and he could remember he had listened with childish interest to its recital as to a tale of enchanted castles and cruel giants. _Now_ he could invest it with a too vivid reality! He had heard, also, he knew not how, and what, at the time, left no distinct impression on his mind, a scandal which said that Lady Lester did penance for unfaithfulness in her early marriage days: this cottage gossip he could now easily trace to her imprisonment by--could he speak it?--_his father!_ He, too, had been twice called by spirited peasants, who, on certain occasions, had resented his arbitrary will--a _b.a.s.t.a.r.d_!

All these things rushed to his mind. There was something in it beyond mere idle gossip--something independent of mere accident! The tale he had listened to was to him a key to the whole. The inference was overpowering! It was as plain to his mind as the noonday sun, that the story he had heard from the lips of Elpsy was founded in truth.

"'Tis true! 'tis _true_! 'tis TRUE!" he groaned, covering his face with his hands.

Oh, was not this an appalling and harrowing reflection for a proud spirit like his? Was it not a bitter, bitter cup that was presented to his lips? Alas, how cruelly barbed and how skilfully directed--how fatally sent, was the shaft of inexorable fate! It pierced the spot where alone it could penetrate; where its wound would be deepest, and the smart the keenest. Struck down from its high seat to the very ground was that pride of birth which const.i.tuted the basis of his character; and withered, dead, bruised in the dust lay the haughtiness of spirit, which, springing from that soil, had flourished like the green bay-tree.

"Not only lowborn--I could bear that, I could bear that! but, oh G.o.d! a _b.a.s.t.a.r.d_! Mercy! mercy! mercy!"

He hid his face as he gave utterance to these words, and sobbed audibly.

He gave way for a few moments to the full tide of his strong and afflicting grief in the most agonizing manner! His soul was rent! his heart was broken! and, altogether, he presented a picture of moral desolation and mental wretchedness that was appalling to contemplate.

What thoughts must then have pa.s.sed through his mind and wrung his proud soul! The reflection that he must abandon all his plans and hopes as Lord of Lester; take leave of the luxuries to which he had been accustomed; descend from the rank of a n.o.ble to that of a peasant; be called "fellow" by the lowest hind; bear the scorn of the highborn and the jeers of the low; and, most of all, that he must for ever abandon, without hope, the love of Kate Bellamont, filled him with wo such as the heart of man hath seldom known.

"And need I forfeit all these?" he exclaimed, suddenly checking the current of his grief, his features lighting up at the same time with guilty exultation, and a.s.suming an expression of deep determination; "need I make this sacrifice? May I not still be Lord of Lester?" he cried, rising in his stirrups and almost shouting with the force of his thoughts. "Ay, and _will I_! Ay, and _will I_! 'Tis but to silence, either with gold or true steel, this beldame, who is the sole depositary of the secret of my birth!"

For a moment after giving utterance to this guilty idea he rode silently along; his honourable nature and his inflexible pride both having instantly risen at the criminal suggestion, and revolted at a deception so vast. But there were two strong motives which threatened to weigh down these better promptings, though honour pointed to the course he should alone pursue. He could not bear--his proud spirit could never brook, that the despised fisher's lad--the humble, low-nurtured peasant--for such he was, notwithstanding his n.o.ble birth, should stand in his place, and _he_ himself--oh, it was madness to think of it--sink into the fisher's boy!

"No! perish honour--perish truth--perish all that is n.o.ble or virtuous in my nature first!" he cried, with the reckless decision of one who has resolved to sustain wrong at the expense of right.

There was a second motive, the love of Kate Bellamont! Should he resign her for ever? Could he endure the scornful disdain with which he believed she would regard him? Above all, could he bear to have the handsome fisher's lad, whom he already looked upon, in some sort, in the light of a rival, sue successfully as Lord of Lester for her hand? Could he endure all this and be human? Could he resign all to become what he dared not contemplate, and live?

"No!" he cried, vehemently, "away with all justice and truth! let my heart be wrapped in a mesh of falsehoods first! But need there be falsehood? Silence, _silence_ will effect it. Is there injustice when the victim is ignorant of his rights?" he asked, mentally, as if he were arguing with his own soul. "Yes, most foul! and silence will be a living tongue to torture me--a never-ending falsehood to degrade--and will cast over the soul a night that can never know a dawn! Shall I incur this load of guilt? Will what I gain by the purchase repay me for the sacrifice of truth and honesty? Shall I not even be happier, ay, and more n.o.ble, as the poor fisher's lad, having done justice, than as Lord of Lester and Castle More, convicted at my soul's tribunal of guilt, and knowing who and what I am?"

Such was the train of reasoning that insensibly pa.s.sed through his mind, and to which he gave utterance at this extraordinary crisis of his fate, and which promised to overthrow his former criminal resolutions.

"But should I do as my better nature prompts," he continued, after galloping forward a few moments, reining up and pursuing his former train of reasoning, "I need not be compelled to take the place of this Lester in his fishing hut, nor need I to remain within the atmosphere of Castle More, to meet the scorn of the n.o.ble, the insults of the lowborn.