Part 41 (1/2)
When he at last spoke, his voice was calm, without a trace of anger or bitterness.
”Mrs. LaGrange, I have been informed that in the days before you ruined my father's life you were an actress in a second-cla.s.s London playhouse, and I see you have not yet lost some little tricks of the stage; but we are not now before the footlights, and it will be much better to lay aside everything pertaining to them. Nothing that you have said has awakened my pity or touched my sympathies for you; in fact, what you have told me has only steeled my heart against you because of its utter falsity. It is unnecessary to go over the ground again, but if you could not reciprocate the love and devotion bestowed upon you by my father, you should never have accepted it; but accepting it as you did, you were bound by every consideration to be true and loyal to that love and to him. Instead, from beginning to end, you have been false to him, false to his memory, false to your own wifehood and motherhood, false to yourself! I have not come here to reproach you, however. I will only say that I do not believe the capacity--the capability even--of love exists, or has ever existed, within you. But,” he continued, in gentler tones, ”the capacity for suffering does exist, and I can see without any simulation on your part that you have suffered.”
Before the look of pity which now for the first time softened the stern features, she broke down, and genuine tears coursed down her pallid cheeks as she cried, ”Suffered! what have I not suffered!
I am homeless, penniless, degraded, an outcast! There is no hope, no help for me unless you will help me. I know what you must think of me, how even you, my son, must despise me, but as a drowning man catches at a straw, I sent for you, hoping that you would in mercy pity me and help me.”
”Do you wish me to help you pecuniarily? I will willingly do that.”
”Pecuniarily!” she exclaimed, almost in scorn. ”Cannot you understand what I need most? It is pity, sympathy, love! I want the love and support of my first-born son, and I am willing to beg for it,” and, rising from her chair, she threw herself upon her knees beside him, ”only be my son, forget the past and let me be to you, as I am, your mother! No, let me be!” she exclaimed, as he would have raised her from her kneeling posture. ”I have no son but you, for Walter, like his father, has deserted me, with taunts and sneers. I can help you, too,” she added, eagerly, but in low tones, ”help you in a way of which you little dream. Do you know what Ralph Mainwaring will attempt next? He will try to implicate you in the murder of Hugh Mainwaring!”
”That will be no more than you yourself attempted at the inquest,”
he answered.
”Ah, but his motive is different; in my case it was but the resort of a weak woman to divert suspicion from herself; but he will seek to fasten this crime upon you to defeat you, to crush and ruin you, because he fears you as his opponent, and it is within my power to clear you from any charges he may bring against you.”
Her voice sank nearly to a whisper, her eyes were dilated, and she was trembling with excitement.
He watched her intently for a moment, then spoke in a tone of calm command. ”Tell me how you could help me. What do you know of that affair?”
”Listen, and I will tell you,” and leaning towards him, she whispered a few words in his ears.
Only a few words, but Harold Mainwaring started as from a shock, while his face grew as pale as her own, and it was with difficulty he could control his voice, as he demanded in quick, excited tones,--
”Do you know what you are saying? Are you speaking the truth?”
”Yes, before Heaven, it is the truth, and the horror of it has haunted me day and night; the thought of it has driven me nearly mad, but I dared not breathe it to any living human being.”
”You have told no one else what you have just told me?”
”No, I dared not.”
He asked a few more questions which she answered, and from her manner he was convinced that she spoke the truth. Then he sat for a moment silent, his head bowed, his eyes covered, lost in thought, while strangely commingled emotions surged within his breast.
At last she broke the silence. ”It will help you--what I have told you--will it not?”
”It is of inestimable value to me,” he answered, but instead of exultation, there was a strange sadness in his voice.
”You will let me help you, and you will be a son to me, will you not?”
He looked at her with an expression of mingled pity and bitterness, and then, without replying, lifted her gently but firmly and reseated her, while he himself remained standing at a little distance. She watched him anxiously.
”Harold,” at last she ventured, ”think what I have suffered, and do not refuse my one prayer.”
”I can see that you have suffered,” he answered, gently; ”and, as I have told you, I will help you pecuniarily and will befriend you, only do not ask me that which I cannot give.”
”I ask nothing more,” she exclaimed, pa.s.sionately, rising to her feet, ”than that you be a son to me, and I will accept nothing less.”