Part 2 (1/2)

Outside the birds were singing carols of love to the roses after the joy of a summer shower. The scent of wet, brown earth was alluring to Michael, yet he sat still, knowing that something momentous stirred in the evening air.

The lines round Sir Henry's mouth were hardening.

”Who won?”

”I, sir.”

”Ah!”

It was an enigmatical sound.

Michael plucked up courage and met the stare of cold blue eyes steadily.

”He had used his little sister roughly.”

”What was that to you?”

”She is a playmate of mine, sir.”

”_Playmate of yours!_”

”Yes, sir.”

”A Conyers playmate to your father's son? What do you mean, boy?”

Michael drew himself up stiffly and told the tale in brief. He had played with little Gabrielle Conyers--and fought for her. He did not say how he was for ever and ever her true knight.

Yet when he had finished, the old man opposite was sneering.

”It was well for you her father knew nought of such play,” said he sourly, ”or I might have had to look farther for an heir.”

Michael's eyes blazed.

”May I speak, sir?” he asked huskily, and never waited even for the curt nod of acquiescence.

”I would know about my father,” he said slowly and very steadily. ”My mother wept when I spoke of him, but she would say no word save that I should know well enough one day. Neither would she tell me whether he were alive or dead. But I am a child no longer, and will be at the mercy of no man who dares call my father foul names, whilst I have no knowledge to enable me to slit their tongues for such lies.”

Silence in the wainscotted room.

How the bird-song without jarred.

”So you would know?” said Sir Henry dully. ”Then I will tell you.”

The proud, aristocratic old face was very hard and set.

”Your father,” he said monotonously, ”was my only son. He was handsome--you shall see his portrait presently. And I was proud of him. So was his mother. But she should not have hidden his faults from me. It is so with women: they weaken with their pampering where discipline should strengthen. I knew nothing of his gambling at Oxford, or his reputation later on at Arthur's and White's, where Stephen Berrington became, I believe, a notable figure--as a pigeon ready for plucking.

”I remained here and knew nothing, only picturing my son according to my fancy. Then the inevitable happened. He got mixed up in one of those bubble Jacobite plots which were for ever being blown by the friends of poor Prince Charlie. He and his bosom companion, Ralph Conyers, were burning, it seemed, with zeal for the royal exile. I do not say that I altogether disapproved, though warning them of the penalties of rashness.

”They did not listen--I hardly expected them to, though I warned them again before they set out on that fatal day to Ireland, where, in due course, their hero was to land.