Stranica 181 [181]
LITTLE LORD FAUNTLEROY. 161
ed
The veins on the old Earl’s forehead stood out like purple
cords. Something else stood out upon it too—cold drops of moist¬
ure. He took out his handkerchief and swept them away. His smile
grew even more bitter.
"And I,” he said, "I objected to—to the other woman, the
mother of this child” (pointing to the sleeping form on the sofa);
"1 refused to recognize her. And yet she could spell her own name.
1 suppose this is retribution.”
Suddenly he sprang up from his chair and began to walk up
and down the room. Fierce and terrible words poured forth from
his lips. His rage and hatred and cruel disappointment shook him
as a storm shakes a tree. His violence was something dreadful to
see, and yet Mr. Havisham noticed that at the very worst of his
wrath he never seemed to forget the little sleeping figure on the
yellow satin cushion, and that he never once spoke loud enough to
awaken it.
"] might have known it,” he said. ‘They were a disgrace to me
from their first hour! I hated them both; and they hated me! Bevis
was the worse of the two. I will not believe this yet, though! I will
contend against it to the last. But it is like Bevis — it is like him!”
And then he raged again and asked questions about the
woman, about her proofs, and pacing the room, turned first white
and then purple in his repressed fury.
When at last he had learned all there was to be told, and knew
the worst, Mr. Havisham looked at him with a feeling of anxiety.
He looked broken and haggard and changed. His rages had always
been bad for him, but this one had been worse than the rest because
there had been something more than rage init. ——
He came slowly back to the sofa, at last, and stood near it.
‘If any one had told me I could be fond of a child,” he said, his
harsh voice low and unsteady, "I should not have believed them.
II