Part 29 (1/2)
”The lad,” returned Hogan, ”must be hie he carried Let an drew a taper nearer, and spreading the paper upon the table, he smoothed it out, and read:
HONOURED SIR,
The bearer of the present should, if he rides well, outstrip another er I have dispatched to you upon a fool's errand, with a letter addressed to one Mr Lane at the sign of the Anchor The bearer of that is none other than the notorious nant, Sir Crispin Galliard, by whose hand your son was slain under your very eyes at Worcester, whose capture I know that you warmly desire and hom I doubt not you will kno to deal To us he has been a source of no little molestation; his liberty, in fact, is a perpetual hteen years this Galliard has believed dead a son that my cousin bore him News of this son, whom I have just informed him lives--as indeed he does--is the bait ith I have lured him to your address Forewarned by the present, I ly But ere that justice he escaped at Worcester be meted out to hiive hi him to you to receive Inforan paused, and shot a furtive glance at Galliard The knight was leaning forward now, his eyes strained, his forehead beaded with perspiration, and his breathing heavy
”Read on,” he begged hoarsely
His son, Jocelyn Marleigh, is the bearer of this letter, the man whom he has injured and who detests him, the youth hom he has, by a curious chance, been in much close association, and whoasped Crispin Then with sudden vigour, ”Oh, 'tis a lie,” he cried, ”a fresh invention of that lying brain to torture an held up his hand
”There is a little more,” he said, and continued:
Should he doubt this, bid him look closely into the lad's face, and ask hie it evokes Should he still doubt thereafter, thinking the likeness to which he has been singularly blind to be no ht foot It bears a mark that I think should convince hi you to keep all infore frohty ends to serve Within a few days of your receipt of this letter, I look to have the honour of waiting upon you In the meanwhile, honoured sir, believe that while I am, I am your obedient servant,
JOSEPH ASHBURN
Across the narrow table the two an's full of concern and pity, Crispin's charged with amazement and horror A little while they sat thus, then Crispin rose slowly to his feet, and with steps uncertain as a drunkard's he crossed to theHe pushed it open, and let the icy wind upon his face and head, unconscious of its sting Moht went over the last fewat Perth with Kenneth Stewart He recalled how strangely and unaccountably he had been drawn to the boy when first he beheld hi for which he could not account, since the lad's character had little that ht commend him to such a man as Crispin, he had contrived that Kenneth should serve in his company
He recalled how at first--aye, and often afterwards even--he had sought to win the boy's affection, despite the fact that there was naught in the boy that he truly admired, and s were dictated by Nature to his unconscious mind? It must indeed be so, and the written words of Joseph Ashburn to Colonel Pride were true Kenneth was indeed his son; the conviction was upon him He conjured up the lad's face, and a cry of discovery escaped him How blind he had been not to have seen before the likeness of Alice--his poor, butchered girl-wife of eighteen years ago
How dull never before to have realized that that likeness it was had drawn him to the boy
He was calhts, and he was shocked to find that they were not joyous He yearned--as he had yearned that night in Worcester--for the lad's affection, and yet, for all his yearning, he realized that with the conviction that Kenneth was his offspring came a dull sense of disappointht would have had hiht from him The craven hands that had reared the lad had warped his nature; he would guide it henceforth; he would straighten it out into a nobler shape
Then he smiled bitterly to himself What manner of man was he to train a youth to loftiness and honour?--he, a debauched ruler with a nickname for which, had he any sense of shaain he remembered the lad's disposition towards hiht, he hoped, he knew that he would now be able to overcome
He closed the , and turned to face his coain, and calard beyond its wont
”Hogan, where is the boy?”
”I have detained hian I am convinced”
The Irish the door he called an order to the trooper waiting in the passage
So, with no word uttered between them
At last steps sounded in the corridor, and a an signed to the trooper, who closed the door and withdrew
As Kenneth entered, Crispin advanced a step and paused, his eyes devouring the lad and receiving in exchange a glance that was full of ht have known, sir, that you were not far away,” he exclai for the ht ”I uessed that my detention was your work”
”Why so?” asked Crispin quietly, his eyes ever scanning the lad's face with a pathetic look