CHAPTER XVII.
Itwas well on towards twelve o’clock before either Skelton or Lewis awaked. The candles had long since burnt out, and the great, square, sombre room was quite dark. Since the early morning the sky had become overcast, and a steady, cold rain was falling outside. The penetrating damp air chilled Skelton to the bone, and he waked with an uncomfortable start. At the very same instant, Lewis, lying on the sofa, also roused, and both pairs of eyes, so strangely alike, were fixed on each other.
Skelton was still under the spell of that burst of parental passion that had overcome him the night before. His sleep had been full of dreams of the boy, and when he waked and saw Lewis’s black eyes gazing with sleepy wonder into his own, it seemed the most natural thing in the world.
There was always something compelling in Skelton’s glance, but the affectionate expression that gave his eyes a velvety softness, like a woman’s, was altogether new to Lewis Pryor. It exercised a certain magnetism over him, and he felt his own gaze fixed on Skelton’s by a power he could not understand. He lay there for some minutes under the fascination of Skelton’s eyes, with a half-sleepy curiosity; then he rolled off the sofa, and, still obeying a new andstrange impulse, went up to him. As Lewis stood looking down upon the man that had never in all those years shown him the slightest mark of personal fondness, some emotion novel and inscrutable and overpoweringly sweet seemed to wake within his boyish heart. He felt instinctively the forging of a new bond, but it was all misty and uncertain to his mind. The waking in the strange room, instead of his own little cosy bedroom, with Bob Skinny shaking him and pleading with him “to git up, fur de Lord’s sake, Marse Lewis�—the rising ready dressed, the finding of Skelton looking at him with that expression of passionate tenderness, was like a dream to him. Skelton put out his hand—his impulse was to open his arms and strain the boy to his breast—and said:
“Lewis, have you slept well?�
“Yes, sir,� after a pause answered Lewis.
“So have I,� said Skelton, “although I did not mean to sleep when I threw myself in this chair. But you should sleep well and peacefully, my boy. Tell me,� he continued, holding the boy’s hand in his strong yet gentle clasp, “tell me, have I, in all these years that we have lived together, have I ever spoken unkindly to you?�
Lewis thought for a moment gravely, bringing his narrow black brows together.
“No, sir, not that I remember,� he replied, after a moment.
“It is not likely that I would,� said Skelton in a voice of the most thrilling sweetness, “for you are mine—you are more to me than the whole world. You are my son.�
If Skelton expected Lewis to fall upon his neck when these words were uttered, he was cruelly disappointed. The boy drew himself up perfectly rigid. He put up his arm as if to ward off a blow, and turned deathly pale. Skelton, watching him with jealous affection, felt as if a knife had entered his heart when he saw the pallor, the distress, that quickly overcame Lewis. Neither spoke for some moments. Skelton, leaning forwards in his chair, his face pale and set, but his eyes burning, and his heart thumping like a nervous woman’s, watched the boy in a sort of agony of affection, waiting for the answering thrill that was to bring Lewis to his arms. But Lewis involuntarily drew farther off. A deep flush succeeded his first paleness; his face worked piteously, and suddenly he burst into a passion of tears.
Skelton fell back in his chair, with something like a groan. He had not meant to tell it in that way; he had been betrayed into it, as it were, by the very tenderness of his love, by the scorn of the idea that anybody should suspect that he would permit the Blairs, or anybody in the world, to profit to Lewis’s disadvantage. He had sometimes in bitterness said to himself that love was not meant for him. Whether he loved—as he truly did—in that first early passion for Elizabeth Armistead, he was scorned and cast aside; or whether he was loved with adoring tenderness, as he had been by the woman he married, yet it laid upon him a burden that he had carried angrily and rebelliously for many years. And seeing in Sylvia Shapleigh a woman that in his maturity he could love, there was linked with it either makinghis enemies rich at his expense, or else proclaiming the stain upon this boy to the world. And he did so love the boy! But after a while his indomitable courage rose. Lewis was excited; he did not fully take in what had been said to him; he could not understand what splendid possibilities were opened to him in those few words, how completely the face of existence was changed for him. Skelton tried to speak, but his voice died in his throat. He made a mighty effort, and it returned to him, but strained and husky.
“Lewis,� he said, “what distresses you? When I said that you were mine, I meant that henceforth you should be acknowledged to the world; that you should have from me all the tenderness that has been pent up in my heart for so many years; that you should have a great fortune. If you think I have wronged you, is not this reparation enough?�
“No,� said the boy after a while, controlling his sobs; “I know what it means if I am your son, Mr. Skelton. It means that I cannot hold up my head among honourable people again. Nothing can make up to me for that.�
Skelton remained silent. An impulse of pride in the boy came to him. Surely, Lewis was bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh. No boy of mean extraction could have that lofty sensibility. Lewis, gaining courage, spoke again, this time with dogged obstinacy.
“Mr. Bulstrode always told me that I was the son of Thomas Pryor and Margaret Pryor; and I have my father’s books and his picture upstairs—and—and—I believe heismy father, Mr. Skelton.�
To hear him speak of another man as his father gave Skelton a pang such as he had not felt for many years.
“But,� he said gently, “it can be proved; and you must see for yourself, Lewis, how immensely it would be to your worldly advantage.�
“It is not to my advantage to know—to feel—that—that I am nobody’s son; that my mother was— No! no!� he cried, bursting into tears again, “I’ll not believe it.�
It was plain to Skelton from the boy’s manner that the idea was not wholly new to him. After a painful pause Skelton asked quietly:
“Have you ever had a suspicion, a feeling, that you were not what the world believes you to be?�
Lewis would not answer this, and Skelton repeated it. Lewis remained obstinately silent, and that told the whole story.
“And,� again asked Skelton, his voice trembling, “have you never felt any of those instinctive emotions, any of that natural feeling towards me, that I felt towards you the first moment I saw you, when you were barely six years old? for I tell you that, had I never seen you until this moment, there is something—there is the strong voice of Nature—that would tell me you were my son.�
To this, also, Lewis would make no answer. It had begun to dawn upon his boyish soul that, along with his own keen shame and distress, he was inflicting something infinitely keener and more distressing upon Skelton.
There was a longer pause after this. Lewis ceased his sobbing, and sat, with a white andwretched face, looking down, the image of shame and sorrow. As for Skelton, his heart was torn with a tempest of feeling. Disappointment and remorse and love and longing battled fiercely within him. With all his wealth, with all his power, with all his capacity to charm, he could not bring to him that one childish heart for which he yearned. He was not unprepared for shame and even reproaches on the boy’s part, but this stubborn resistance was maddening. A dull-red flush glowed in his dark face. He was not used to asking forgiveness, but if the boy exacted it he would not even withhold that.
“It is hard—it is hard for a father to ask forgiveness of his child, but I ask it of you, Lewis. Your mother granted it me with her dying breath. Will you be more unforgiving than she? Will you deny me the reparation that would have made her happy?�
Lewis raised his black eyes to Skelton’s.
“Yes, I forgive you,� he said simply; “but, Mr. Skelton, you can’t expect me to give up my good name without a struggle for it. Wouldn’t you struggle for yours, sir?�
“Yes,� answered Skelton, with that glow of pride which he always felt when Lewis showed manliness of feeling.
“Then, sir, you can’t complain when I—when Mr. Bulstrode—Mr. Bulstrode is my guardian, sir—�
“But, Lewis,� continued Skelton, without the smallest impatience but with a loving insistence, “this is trifling. Why should I open this terrible subject unless everything concerning it were proved—unless it were demanded? Do you think this asudden madness on my part? It is not. It is, I admit, a sudden determination. I had meant to wait until you were twenty-one—until you were prepared in a measure for it; but circumstances, and the love I bear you, Lewis, have hastened it.�
Lewis sat gravely considering.
“Then, Mr. Skelton, let it rest until I am twenty-one. I am only fifteen now—that is,� with a burning blush, “Mr. Bulstrode says I am only fifteen, and I am not tall for my age—and I can’t—depend upon myself as I ought; and I think it’s only fair, sir, to wait until I am a man before forcing this thing on me. But I think it only fair to you, sir,� he added after a pause, and rising, “to say that I mean to make the best fight for my good name that I can. It may be as you say; it may be that—that my mother—� here the boy choked. “I can’t say it, sir. I don’t remember her, but I tell you, Mr. Skelton,—if—for the sake of all your money I agreed that my mother was—I mean, sir, if any man for the sake of money, or anything else, would dishonour his mother, it would be a villainy. I don’t express myself very well, but I know what I mean; and I ask you, sir, would you act differently in my place?�
Lewis had truly said that he was not tall for his age, but as he spoke his slight, boyish figure seemed to rise to man’s stature. At first he was hesitating and incoherent in his speech, but before he finished he fixed his eyes on Skelton’s so boldly that Skelton almost flinched under the glance. But still there was in his heart that proud instinct of the father which made itself felt, saying:
“This, indeed, is my son—my soul—my own spirit.�
Lewis waited, as if for an answer. Skelton, whose patience and mildness had suffered no diminution, answered him gently:
“Our cases are different. You are more unfortunate than I, but one thing I feel deeply: the regard you have for your good name; the reluctance you have to exchange it for any worldly consideration is not lost on me. On the contrary, it makes you still dearer to me. I acknowledge, had you not recognised the point of honour involved, I should have been disappointed. But I am not disappointed in you—I never can be.�
Lewis persisted in his question, though.
“But won’t you tell me, Mr. Skelton—suppose you had been offered Deerchase, and all your fortune and everything, if you would agree that your mother was—was—I can’t say it, sir.And would you have taken it?�
The answer was drawn from Skelton against his will; but the boy stood with the courage and persistence of an accusing conscience, asking the question of which the answer seemed so conclusive to his young mind.
“No,� at last answered Skelton in a low voice.
“Then, sir,� said Lewis eagerly, “do you blame me for acting likewise?�
“But there is no volition in the case,� said Skelton. “It is forced upon you, my poor boy. You have no choice.�
“At least,� said Lewis, after a moment, while his eyes filled with tears, “at least, I will stand up formy mother as long as I can; at least, I will make the best fight for her own good name that I know how. And I tell you, Mr. Skelton, that even—even if I am forced, as you say—to—to—acknowledge it, I’ll never profit by it. This I made up my mind to a long time ago—ever since I first began to wonder—�
Skelton knew then that, in the boy’s crude, inexperienced way, he had prepared himself to meet the emergency when it came. Lewis turned to go out of the room, but Skelton called him back and silently drew the boy towards him. He passed his hand over Lewis’s closely cropped black head and rested it fondly on his shoulder, all the time looking into the boy’s eyes with tenderness unspeakable. In that moment a faint stirring of Nature came to Lewis. He began to feel his heart swell towards Skelton with a feeling of oneness. Skelton saw in his troubled, changeful look a new expression. Something like affection quivered in the boy’s face. Skelton bent and kissed him softly on the forehead, and Lewis went out silently.