FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   228   229   230   231   232   233   234   235   236   237   238   239   240   241   242   243   244   245   246   247   248   249   250   251   252  
253   254   255   256   257   258   259   260   261   262   263   264   265   266   267   268   269   270   271   272   273   274   275   276   277   >>   >|  
rd; and Lucretia, who had watched him while he read, was struck with the self-control he evinced when he came to the end of the disclosure. She laid her hand on his and said,-- "Courage! you have lost nothing!" "Nothing!" said Ardworth, with a bitter smile. "A father's love and a father's name,--nothing!" "But," exclaimed Lucretia, "is this man your father? Does a father's heart beat in one line of those hard sentences? No, no; it seems to me probable,--it seems to me almost certain, that you are--" She stopped, and continued, with a calmer accent, "near to my own blood. I am now in England, in London, to prosecute the inquiry built upon that hope. If so, if so, you shall--" Madame Dalibard again stopped abruptly, and there was something terrible in the very exultation of her countenance. She drew a long breath, and resumed, with an evident effort at self-command, "If so, I have a right to the interest I feel for you. Suffer me yet to be silent as to the grounds of my belief, and--and--love me a little in the mean while!" Her voice trembled, as if with rushing tears, at these last words, and there was almost an agony in the tone in which they were said, and in the gesture of the clasped hands she held out to him. Much moved (amidst all his mingled emotions at the tale thus made known to him) by the manner and voice of the narrator, Ardworth bent down and kissed the extended hands. Then he rose abruptly, walked to and fro the room, muttering to himself, paused opposite the window, threw it open, as for air, and, indeed, fairly gasped for breath. When he turned round, however, his face was composed, and folding his arms on his large breast with a sudden action, he said aloud, and yet rather to himself than to his listener,-- "What matter, after all, by what name men call our fathers? We ourselves make our own fate! Bastard or noble, not a jot care I. Give me ancestors, I will not disgrace them; raze from my lot even the very name of father, and my sons shall have an ancestor in me!" As he thus spoke, there was a rough grandeur in his hard face and the strong ease of his powerful form. And while thus standing and thus looking, the door opened, and Varney walked in abruptly. These two men had met occasionally at Madame Dalibard's, but no intimacy had been established between them. Varney was formal and distant to Ardworth, and Ardworth felt a repugnance to Varney. With the instinct of sound, sterling, weig
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   228   229   230   231   232   233   234   235   236   237   238   239   240   241   242   243   244   245   246   247   248   249   250   251   252  
253   254   255   256   257   258   259   260   261   262   263   264   265   266   267   268   269   270   271   272   273   274   275   276   277   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

father

 

Ardworth

 

abruptly

 

Varney

 

stopped

 

breath

 

walked

 

Madame

 

Dalibard

 

Lucretia


listener

 

breast

 
matter
 

sudden

 

action

 
fathers
 

watched

 

paused

 

muttering

 
opposite

window

 

extended

 

control

 

struck

 
composed
 

folding

 

turned

 
fairly
 

gasped

 

Bastard


occasionally

 

intimacy

 
opened
 

established

 

instinct

 

sterling

 

repugnance

 
formal
 
distant
 

standing


disgrace

 

ancestors

 

kissed

 

strong

 

powerful

 

grandeur

 

ancestor

 
narrator
 

bitter

 

exclaimed